But, as it turns out, a college education and a prestigious job title do not necessarily mean you'll be raking in cash.
Some gigs, like architect or optometrist, actually pay below what you might expect.
Using data from the US Bureau of Labor Statistics on the mean salary of full-time civilian workers, we've picked out some of the most prestigious jobs that have surprisingly low earnings. Here are 19 of them.
Max Nisen and Aaron Taube contributed to earlier versions of this article.