Families asking themselves if college is a “great equalizer” or a financial burden, may be reassured by a new report released by the University of California which shows that among the UC’s low-income alumni, 77 percent were making more than their parents within the first five years of graduating.

The review released last week combed through the IRS tax records of low-income students enrolled between 1999 and 2005 and found that 36 percent of the lowest income students moved from the bottom 20 percent to the top 20 percent of the income distribution as adults.

“You come out in a completely different financial bracket than your parents,” said Christopher Perez, who graduated from UCLA last year in mechanical engineering and is now pursuing a doctorate in the same field at Stanford.

Throughout his childhood in South Los Angeles, Perez was used to watching his father, a construction worker, and mother, a house cleaner, work tirelessly to earn enough to raise him and his brother.

Enrolling at UCLA, however, was a game changer. Judging by just the summer internships Perez secured with General Electric, defense contractors and Sandia National Labs, where he is spending this summer, he could tell that his financial future would be profoundly different from the financial circumstances of his upbringing. “If you summed up what I make over a summer compared to what my parents make, it’s already more,” he said.

“Data in this report clearly show that a UC degree helps level the playing field and promotes mobility, particularly among low-income students,” said a spokesperson for the UC Office of the President.

For years, UCs have been celebrated for enrolling high numbers of low-income students. “The UC enrolls a higher percentage of Pell Grant recipients than any other top research university,” the report states. In the past year, 38 percent of enrolled undergraduates UC-wide were Pell recipients, with Merced having the largest share of Pell recipients at 64 percent, and Berkeley with smallest at 27 percent.

Kevin Bradley Paule received a Pell grant to study at Berkeley. As a rising senior, soon to graduate in media studies, he’s looking forward to the financial security that his degree will bring.

“Going to a UC does add prestige to your resume, leading to those high-paying jobs,” said Paule. “I don’t know many people that are complaining about low pay after graduation.”

After he graduates, Paule hopes to follow in the footsteps of friends that have pursued careers in the tech and advertising industries.

“Just seeing my friends who have graduated in the past years, they may not be super rich, but they’re definitely much more financially stable than they were when living with their parents,” he said.

Not all industries are equally lucrative for UC alumni. The report released noted that the mean income after 10 years of work in the humanities ranged between $59,1112 to $83,589, whereas 10 years of work in the STEM industry offered a mean income ranging from $100,838 to $134,664.

Paule says it’s not just the degree or the industry that affords the UC’s low-income students such a comfortable future after graduation. At the end of the day, students without parents that can support them after college have little choice but to work hard to make it own their own, Paule explained.

“The diploma is one thing, but it’s all about the hustle,” he said.