If you have an interest in both computer science and business studies, you might be wondering which would be a better major. This post will show you the advantages and disadvantages of each and help you decide which would be a better major for you.
At a glance:
| | Business Administration | Computer science |
| Payscale reported average pay | $66,127 | $85,235 |
| Ease of finding a job | Moderate | High |
| Types of jobs you can qualify for | Project Manager Marketing manager Account manager Operations manager Financial analyst | Software Engineer Software developer Web developer App developer Data scientist Data analyst |
| Difficulty of the major | Easy/Moderate | Moderate/Hard |
| Key things to note | A general degree. This can make it difficult to qualify for specialized jobs that pay better. Can improve your job prospects by double majoring with something more specialized such as finance or computer science. Can make for a good minor. | A very employable degree with just a bachelor’s degree. The jobs typically pay very well, have reasonable hours and high satisfaction. A good major if you are interested in remote work. Can give you access to data science and machine learning roles if you choose the right classes. |
Source for business administration salary and jobs
There are many things to consider when choosing between the two degrees and there are also some important things to be aware of when choosing either of them.
Details about a degree in business administration
Below are some details about a degree in business administration.
Pay
According to Payscale, the average salary of a person with a degree in business administration is $66,127. This is a lot lower than the average pay of someone with a degree in computer science which is reported as being $85,235. This is likely to be because a computer science degree can qualify you for more high-paying jobs, but also because many of them tend to be located in high cost of living areas.
Jobs
A business administration major will have you taking classes in a range of disciplines including: business, finance, accounting, and economics. As a result, a business degree is a somewhat general degree that is not specialized on a particular type of job. This means that the degree can qualify you for a large amount of jobs. However, you will often be less competitive than people who have degrees related to that specific job.
While it can be difficult to compete with people who have degrees related to specific job roles, you can improve your job prospects by getting internships, completing projects and learning skills related to the specific job that you are interested in.
Jobs that you can qualify for with a bachelor’s degree in business administration can include:
- Project Manager
- Marketing manager
- Account manager
- Operations manager
- Financial analyst
Difficulty
Overall, a business administration degree will usually be relatively easy when compared with alternative degrees such as finance, economics and accounting. The reason for this is that, being a general degree, you will not be taking many specialized classes that tend to be more difficult that other majors would include in their junior and senior years.
When compared with computer science, most people would agree that business administration is a lot easier.
Classes you can expect to study
In a business administration degree, you can expect to take the following classes:
Marketing
Accounting
Management
Economics
Finance
Business law
Business ethics
Business principles
You can also expect to have the option to take other business classes as your degree requirement and the ability to take any classes in your electives. It would help to consider what job you are most interested in and to choose your electives accordingly.
Alternative degrees
If you are interested in a business administration degree, there are some alternatives that you might also want to consider such as:
- Finance
- Economics
- Accounting
- Marketing
Things to consider
As mentioned above, a degree in business administration can be quite general which can make it difficult to qualify for specific jobs. With that being the case, it would likely help a lot to minor in another field that is more specialized such as finance or computer science. A double major would also be an option if you are willing and able to put in the extra time. Alternatively, you could major in the more applied major and minor in business administration instead.
Regardless, you will be able to drastically improve your job prospects if you learn skills related to the job you are interested in, take classes related to the job you are interested in, complete related projects, and get internships in that field.
Details about a computer science major
Below are some details about a major in computer science.
Current pay
According to Payscale, the average salary of a person with a bachelor’s degree in computer science is $85,235. This makes computer science one of the best paying degrees available right now. With that being said, some of these salaries may be slightly inflated since a lot of computer science jobs are in very high cost of living areas such as San Francisco.
Many of the alternative degrees to computer science, such as statistics or applied math, will also have high average salaries. However, not only is computer science one of the best-paying degrees, but it also puts you in a good position with just a bachelor’s degree. On the other hand, many of the alternatives require a master’s degree to be competitive when seeking a job.
Also, many people that get alternative degrees to CS actually end up finding themselves in CS type roles. For example, it is not uncommon for applied mathematics or statistics majors to find themselves working in programming roles after graduating. This is why computer science can also be a very good minor. If you have decided to get a business degree, it would help to at least choose computer science as a minor since it will drastically improve your job prospects.
Types of jobs the degree will qualify you for
There are many different types of jobs that a computer science degree will open you up to. These can include:
- Software engineer
- Database administrator
- Data scientist
- Machine learning engineer
- App developer
- Web developer
- Computer systems administrator
Most CS majors will end up taking jobs as a software engineer which is one of the highest-rated jobs available. When interviewing for these roles, you will be tested mainly on algorithms and data structures that you’ll learn about during your time in the major. Make sure to be very comfortable with algorithms and data structures when interviewing.
Data science is another career that is becoming popular among CS majors. If you want to get a job in data science, it would help to take classes in data analysis and machine learning, to learn Python programming, and to complete data science projects. A CS degree combined with classes relevant to data science should put you in a good position to get data science and software engineering jobs.
It would also help to try to get internships during the summer since that will also help you a lot in getting into big tech companies that have very high salaries.
How difficult it is as a major
When compared with a business administration major, most people would agree that computer science is the moree difficult degree. This is because CS will include more mathematics and the CS classes can be difficult themselves.
Types of classes you will study
Some classes that you can expect to take include:
Programming
Data structures
Algorithms
Assembly language
Databases
Computer architecture
Computer networks
You can also expect to take some mathematics classes including:
Linear algebra
Discrete math
Calculus
If your university does not require that you take those math classes, I would strongly recommend that you take them as electives. This is because they are key classes for machine learning and, if you want to go to grad school, they will be important classes to have on your transcript.
Some classes that you might have the choice of taking could also include
Machine learning
Artificial intelligence
Computer graphics
Computer networks
Important things to be aware of when taking the degree
Before you start taking the degree, it would be very important to consider what you think you would like to do with the degree. By doing so you will be able to optimize your classes to be suited towards what you want to do after graduation.
If your goal is to get into data science or machine learning type roles, it would be important to make sure to take machine learning classes, to do machine learning projects, to take classes in data analysis and to take some statistics classes. It would also be important to make sure to take calculus and linear algebra as a freshman or sophomore if they are not required in your major.
Whereas, if your goal is to get a job as a software engineer, it would be more important to take classes that focus on algorithms and systems architecture type classes.
If you think that you want to go to grad school, it would be important to take up research opportunities and to take classes related to what you think you would like to research as a grad student. It would also be important to look at what classes graduate schools want to see when accepting CS master’s applicants.
More details about the computer science major
I have written more about the computer science major here and I have written more about how hard you can expect the major to be here.
Bottom line
As mentioned above, a computer science degree should qualify you for many jobs that pay well and have high levels of job satisfaction. With that being the case, a computer science degree is arguably the best degree that you can get right now overall.
Also, the combination of math and computer science that a CS degree provides can help you qualify for jobs that are quickly growing in popularity including data science and machine learning engineering.
Furthermore, if you think that you would be interested in remote work, a computer science degree would also be one of the best degrees to get since there are many remote software engineering and developer jobs. However, if you are looking to maximize your earnings, it will likely be necessary to move to areas such as Silicon Valley or New York where there are more high-paying CS jobs for software engineering.
While computer science is one of the best degrees to get right now, it might still be the case that it might not be for you. It is a degree that involves a moderate amount of mathematics including calculus and linear algebra. If you are not great at math right now, I would still recommend a CS major since you can quickly improve your math skills using the website khanacademy.org.
A business administration degree can also qualify you for a number of different jobs but not as many as a CS degree and they will not be as highly-paid for the most part. If you do decide to get a business administration degree, it would help a lot to make sure to take classes related to the job that you are most interested in, to learn skills related to that job, to complete related projects and to get internships during the summer. I would also strongly recommend that you consider at least getting a minor in CS since it will improve your job prospects considerably.
