This comparison is somewhat misleading, however. Women remain at a disadvantage compared with men even when the figures are adjusted to compensate for the differences in age and experience. For such chemists with no higher a degree than a B.S., women earn 91 percent of what their male counterparts do. For such chemists with a Ph.D., annual salaries are almost equivalent. Another factor that influences the salary of industrial chemists is the size of their company.
Smaller firms tend to pay less than their larger competitors.
About a quarter of chemists in industry have jobs with firms that employ fewer than 500 workers. THE MOST Median salaries are, at best, only a broad-brush measure for comparing how chemists' salaries stack up. Only a few chemists are positioned at the median in any given year. And the median age of survey respondents remains relatively unchanged from year to year, while individuals grow older. Salaries, meanwhile, typically rise with increasing age and experience.