If it’s operations (such as backoffice of a financial institution) the starting wage can be mid 40′s to mid 50′s. With this field there’s no risk of losing money since you’re not depending on sales and so forth, but the tradeoff is that you’re only extra incentive comes from quarterly or year-end bonuses. Usually there’s little to no commission at all.

And of course with sales the potential to make money is unlimited. It really depends on where you’re going to start in. If it’s in banking, like myself, you’ll get a mid-range salary plus commission and bonuses. Or you can do the 100% commission route, which doesn’t start off bad, like for example at UBS they’ll pay your first year at $65,000, but after that it’s 100% commission, and if you don’t have $3 million in sales generated by the end of the first year then the tradeoof is that you’re let go. (I wonder about the $80,000 figure that was quoted in another blurb above and whether or not it has to do with the UBS example. I haven’t heard of anybody starting right away at $80,000, even with a Master’s.)

So all in all operations you’re looking at mid forties to mid fifties, sales it all depends on how much of a factor commission is.

Hope this helps.