Job 'draft': it's engineers again

College graduates with engineering degrees were again offered the highest average salary -- in the $25,000 range -- but degree holders in the liberal arts averaged offers of only about $14,000 and they were more scarce, the College Placement Council said. In its Salary Survey study, it reported engineering graduates received 65 percent of the job offers, even though college students with engineering majors accounted for only 7 percent of the 1980-81 bachelor's degree candidates.

Students in the humanities and social sciences were 33 percent of the bachelor's degree graduates, but received only 4 percent of the job offers. The salaries associated with the job offers for humanities and social science students averaged $13,992 for social sciences, $14,448 for humanities, and $16, 440 for economics. The salary offers represented a 12 percent increase from the previous year.

The study said business students received 22 percent of the job offers. The highest average offer for bachelor's degree candidates in business was $17,016 and was offered to accounting majors.

Computer science students continued to dominate the job offers in the science disciplines. But their salary offers ranked second behind students majoring in the physical and earth sciences. Employers offered average annual salaries of $ 20,712 to computer science candidates and $22,152 to st udents majoring in physical and earth sciences.