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Social work

For most social workers this is the first of two degrees. The master's after it is what most of the better paid work asks for.

Written by the Sidequest team. Reviewed 2026-09-10.

Where it leads

Child and family social worker, school social worker, hospital social worker, and mental health social worker. Hospital social workers earn $67,880 in the middle of the range.

The week

About 45 hours a week, 15 of them in class. In your last year about two days of every week move out of class and into a real agency, working with real people while a social worker checks what you do.

What people earn four years after they finish
WEAKEST PROGRAMS$43,510TYPICAL$51,470TOP PROGRAMS$60,060

Where people end up

Most become social workers in one of three kinds of work: with children, families and schools, in hospitals, or in mental health and addiction care. The first is the biggest by far, about 399,900 people.

Which one you can do depends on your degrees. Of the people doing child and family work, 7 in 10 say it needs a bachelor's. Of the people doing hospital work, 7 in 10 say it needs a master's.

So most people go back. More than 94 in every 100 licensed social workers hold a master's, and of the ones still working at the bachelor's level, 13 in 100 are studying for one right now.

What a week is like

You take four to six classes at once, which comes out to about 15 credit hours a semester. It is that same load every semester for four years: 120 credits, eight semesters, done.

About 15 of those hours are spent sitting in class. The other 30 are work you do on your own, two hours behind every hour you spend in a room. Call it 45 hours a week.

It is spread across seven days rather than stacked into five, so you can keep your evenings or you can keep your weekends, not usually both. What it does not leave is much slack in the weeks when two big things land on the same day.

A waking week is about 112 hours. This is the share of it the degree takes.

  • In class15 hours
  • Work on your own30 hours
  • Yours67 hours

What those 45 hours are spent on.

  • with other people

    Why people end up needing help, how the offices and programs that give it are run, and the rules a social worker has to follow. By your last two years they are nearly all of what you take.

  • with other peoplethe hard part

    Real people who need help, and a social worker who signs off on what you do. Every accredited social work degree asks for at least 400 hours of it, and it sits on top of a full load of classes, which makes the last year the longest of the four.

  • with other people

    While you are working at the agency, a class meets alongside it every term, and what happened at the agency that week is what it is about.

  • on your own

    Chapters and studies about people, families and the services around them, and papers arguing what should happen. It is most of the work you do on your own.

  • on your own

    One statistics class and one on how studies are run, in your third and fourth years. They are the two classes here that work like maths.

  • on your own

    Writing, a maths class, two science classes, government, and a language or civics. They are nine in every ten credits of your first year.

  • Social work classes9%
  • Statistics and research methods0%
  • Everything else you still have to take91%
  • Classes you pick yourself0%

One class in your whole first year is social work. The rest is writing, maths and science every student takes, and you pick none of it.

How much do you make?

Social work starts low and climbs as you earn more qualifications. A social worker licensed to work as a therapist earns $19,570 a year more than one licensed with only this degree.

  1. Right out of college

    $51,790

    Four years out, social work graduates who are working and not back in school earn $51,790 on average.

  2. Midway through

    $60,000

    Between 35 and 45, the average social work graduate earns $60,000.

  3. At the height of it

    $95,530

    The best paid tenth of child and family social workers earn $95,530.

Almost all of that climb comes from going back to school. This degree gets you the first license. Every license above it needs a master's, and the one that lets you work as a therapist also needs about 3,000 hours of work under a supervisor in most states, a year and a half of full time work, before you can sit its exam.

Nursing, the other big degree for people who want to help, pays about $35,000 a year more four years out. Psychology pays about the same as social work.

What licensed social workers earn in the middle of the range, by the license they hold.

  • Social worker licensed as a therapist$77,250
  • Social worker with a master's$66,950
  • Social worker with a bachelor's$57,680

Most licensed social workers have gone all the way to the therapist license: 59 in every 100.

The average money still owed on student loans

$23,500

The standard plan clears it in ten years.

Is this you?

At many universities you apply twice. You get in, take two or three years of classes, and then apply again to go on into the social work program itself, with a grade floor and hours of volunteering with people who need help, and some ask you to keep a B average in your social work classes to stay in. The other thing to know before you start: if a master's is already the plan, this degree can take a year off it. A lot of master's programs let social work graduates finish in one year instead of two.

Tap any that sound like you.

This is probably you if

Probably not you if

What people who did it say

  • ecualombian, a computer science major who became a therapist

    Hacker News, July 2014

    "I was a once computer science major, now clinical social worker. I work with people that have different stressors in their lives and are learning how to live a life they feel good about."

  • erikerikson

    Hacker News, February 2025

    "Social work is a very low paid existence and most of the social workers I know could easily have earned more elsewhere which they are pained to know but persist through regardless because they care more for living in a world with less total suffering even at the cost of their own."

  • dyiu13, a parent whose daughter is heading into social work

    College Confidential, September 2015

    "She told me she heard that social workers get paid at what society believes their clients are worth."

  • pmiller2

    Hacker News, August 2018

    "I have literally no idea why anyone would go to grad school for an MSW and take on the kind of debt required to do so, then enter a profession with the combination of low salaries and horrible work environment that social work has."

Questions people ask

What can you do with a social work degree?
Social work with children and families, in schools, in hospitals, and in mental health and addiction care. The bachelor's is enough for most child and family work. Hospital work and therapy mostly ask for a master's.
Do you need a master's to be a social worker?
Not for every social worker, but for most. More than 94 in every 100 licensed social workers hold one, and it is what hospital work and therapy ask for.
How long does it take to become a licensed clinical social worker?
About seven years in most states: four for this degree, one or two for the master's, then about 3,000 hours of work under a supervisor before the exam. With this degree behind you, a lot of master's programs let you finish in one year instead of two.
How much do social workers make?
It depends on the license. In the middle of the range it runs from $57,680 at the bachelor's level to $77,250 for clinical social workers, and hospital social workers earn $67,880.
Is social work a hard major?
The reading is not the hard part. The placement is: at least 400 hours inside a real agency on top of your classes, and some programs ask for a B average in your social work classes to stay in.
What is the difference between social work and psychology?
They pay about the same four years out, around $51,000, and most people in both go on to more school. The difference is that social work builds in the placement at a real agency and leads straight to a license.

Where these numbers come from

See the other majors