What are people earning?

Hi, I am a first year student at AAA school of advertising cape town, I am doing a BA in brand communication will be concentrating on art direction. It seems that talking about salaries is taboo, but I would like to know what kind of salary a person with the education I will have had would earn and If the if people are hiring. I want to know so that I know what I am working towards, becuase I am working very hard at my studies.

The other reason I ask is becuase, I have a dimploma in Sound Engineering and after I graduated I realised that the market was saturated and the salaries are very low, I was also told by an engineer that the qualification "meant nothing". I wish I had known this.

A friend of mine, a copywriting student also told me today that the average salary for an art director is R15000 after a couple of years of working and the copywrtiters earn more. If this is true I want to start thinking of ways now to supplement my income in the future.

I also understand that during this economic crisis or whatever they are calling it these days is effecting people in the ad industry badly, so have salaries droped now compared to a year or two ago.

Any information will be valued, thanks