Source: Google Trends.



While there is red hot demand and a rising market for both data scientists and data engineers, evidence suggests that data scientists are in greater demand and command higher salaries. According to a survey by Burtch Works, data scientist salaries rose 8 percent on average in 2014, with bonuses adding USD $56,000. The report was based on telephone interviews with 371 data scientists and team leaders. Note that telephone interview surveys have significant scientific methodology flaws that sometimes distort reality yet may be useful.



The median base salary for entry-level data scientists was $91,000 nationally (United States) and $110,000 in Silicon Valley.



For experienced data scientists, salaries exceed $250,000.



Glassdoor.com estimates the following average salaries:



Data scientists make $118,709 on average.



Data engineers make $95,936 on average



Data analysts make $62,379 on average.



See also the KDnuggets 2015 Data Science Salary Survey that claims data scientists make about $122,000 on average and data science managers make $176,000 on average.



In reality, real professional data scientist salaries are much higher than reported in these non-scientific surveys considering that many garden variety data analysts and general business analysts have opportunistically renamed themselves as data scientists bringing the average salary down significantly.



In addition, data science team leaders (also known as business architects) make considerably more than both data scientists and data engineers yet no scientific survey has focused on average salaries for data science team leaders.



There is also a shift in demand for data scientists from start-ups to established organizations. The share of data scientists employed by start-ups fell by more than half, to 14% in 2014 from 29% in 2013. This is evidence that mainstream industries in both the private and pubic sectors are building data science teams.



See: http://bit.ly/10TgVHG