A senior official with the Ministry of Education, Science and Technology on Monday said, "The government is considering ways to disclose the average first-year salaries of graduates by university and by department in September, when it discloses the graduate employment rate."

"If the income levels of each university's graduates were disclosed, such information would help students and parents to select universities, instigating healthy competition between universities," the official added.

The ministry plans to calculate the average first-year salaries of graduates using the National Health Insurance Corporation database, which contains the income records of all regular employees. The official said, "Only the average first-year salaries of graduates -- not the first-year salaries of individual graduates -- will be disclosed, by university and by department. Disclosing such qualitative information should help the development of universities."

But this could spark controversy, given probable opposition from those who claim such policies focus on financial criteria only.