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Many Junior Scientists Need To Take a Hard Look at Their Job Prospects (nature.com)
In its careers section this week, science journal Nature surveyed more than 5,700 early-career scientists worldwide who are working on PhDs. Three-quarters of them, they told the journal, think it's likely that they will pursue an academic career when they graduate. How many of them will succeed? The editorial board of the journal wrote in a column published on Wednesday. Most PhD students will have to look beyond academia for a career, the editorial board added. From the article: Statistics say these young researchers will have a better chance of pursuing their chosen job than the young footballers. But not by much. Global figures are hard to come by, but only three or four in every hundred PhD students in the United Kingdom will land a permanent staff position at a university. It's only a little better in the United States. Simply put, most PhD students need to make plans for a life outside academic science. And more universities and PhD supervisors must make this clear. That might sound like an alarmist and negative attitude for the International Weekly Journal of Science. But it has been evident for years that international science is training many more PhD students than the academic system can support. Most of the keen and talented young scientists who responded to our survey will probably never get a foot in the door. Of those who do, a sizeable number are likely to drift from short-term contract to short-term contract until they become disillusioned and look elsewhere.
But in my experience it was a blessing. Academia is so political now - not just to get in, but to stay in (tenure). Also they expect you to work yourself to death until you get tenure. Otherwise, your just a permanent postdoc wondering why you spent so long and so much to get the pay you're getting.
In debates about Christianity, there are two groups: those looking for answers, and those looking to just ask questions.
To the extent that professors train more than one graduate student, the number of graduate students who become tenured professors will decrease.
(In today's world, what is going to happen is that they take slots as underpaid adjunct professors teaching introductory undergraduate classes for a few years, then eventually turn to something else.)
In any case, working in your chosen field is hardly even an issue. There are a lot of engineers, chemical, electrical, civil, who I know who code. They did not want to code, but that is where the money is. Likewise, most people with doctorates I know are making a living. I wonder what the percentage of people who actually dedicated their whole live to sport, as opposed to just using it as a means to end, actually are making a living at it. I suspect, for most high school, the number is close to zero. I suspect overall the number is close to zero.
"She's a scientist and a lesbian. She's not going to let it slide." Orphan Black
The government does not spend nearly enough tax money on scientific research. It slows down our rate of technological progress.
I think of this whenever I see something like Bill Nye trying to get kids interested in studying science. Yes, we need more science, but we do not need more scientists. because we already have too many and don't have work for them.
And, guiding a child towards a career that will leave them with lifelong student debt, an unmarketable degree, and a head full of shattered dreams, is tantamount to child abuse.
This should be totally obvious. If you are just training PhDs to train other PhDs to train other PhDs, you basically just have a pyramid scheme. But actually, there is work to do! Not everyone can train more of themselves, some people just need to settle down and do research! This is an expectation/logic problem. (Or a very smart ploy on the part of institutions to bring down the cost of hiring PhDs...why would PhD holders participate in that? Failure to reason!)
Signed,
A dropout of the academic system that is very happy with the $$$$ I have now
Can I mod something +1 Scary if it's true but I wish it weren't?
Changing the student loan system will fix a lot of the issues with academic.
Any ways PHD level CS people can be very clueless working in tech to the point of not even knowing how to turn a computer on.
the drugs that kept a family member of mine alive were made in Europe at public Universities. Most drugs are (and then they're packaged up my big Pharma into profits). The computer I'm typing on wouldn't exist without massive public spending.
We're cutting all this back so we can give more and more money to the elites. Let's stop that. I get it, everybody's afraid of tax raises because even at $250k/yr a lot of us are paycheck to paycheck (60-80% depending on how you run the numbers). But here's a crazy idea: We can raise taxes on the wealthy elite without raising taxes on the workers? I know, crazy right? All it takes is to stop voting for your friendly neighborhood right winger. Oh, and make sure you show up at your Primaries so they don't sneak an economic right winger in because they're socially left wing.
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Having gone through all this myself, my advice would be: "assume you will be average". Will this particular career let you have a decent life if you end up being about average in your field? If not, consider something else.
Seriously, don't.
There are better ways to be frustrated with your life.
Only 3-4%!? (Is that similar in other countries?)
I'm *so* happy now that I picked a Masters degree where I can either choose to work directly after getting it or still do a PhD anyway (which would be more for fun than $$$ at this point...)
Except for the fact that politics in the US presents us with a false choice; Democrat or Republican. The idea that this is a choice is an illusion created and fostered by the establishment to keep us believing that we have a choice. In reality, both parties are essentially the same and it doesn't matter what you choose, you're always gonna gets screwed.
Whatever the department - physics, journalism, drama, or "human performance" (athletes) - professors and department chairs need lots of students in order to keep their own jobs, regardeless of whether there are enough job opportunities in the field for the students upon graduation.
I am not a young researcher or Ph D student at all.
With that out of the way, Mars beckons. Be the one with the "right stuff".
The proposed terrestrial Mars City will be on terra firma.
Dodge the singularity by proving them all wrong -- Young research scientists do get laid.
Or be the genius that figured out that the global climate change is real, but it can be avoided. The global leaders should meet. But not in Paris. The new accord will be set in Bruges instead. And they will be riding driverless EV stretch limousines from Maybach.
I always say that being a scientist is like being an artist: it is a privilege just to be able to pursue my passion, even if it isn't a great career choice. I didn't get a PhD because it made financial sense, I did it because I have this insatiable curiosity and academic research gives me access to resources that I wouldn't have any other way.
I went through grad school in a similar illusion of going into a strictly academic position. Then I went through a postdoc position and hit a wall. There are lots and lots of PhDs running around out there who tried the same and failed the same.
Thankfully a lot of advisers now are more receptive to their students announcing early that they want to follow a non-academic track (many before used to reject prospective students who wanted that). However not many are great at steering their grad students towards it. If the faculty advisers were even honest about the time commitments expected of junior faculty in the hard sciences (generally starting around 80 hours a week) that would steer many students down another path.
That said, I have a non-academic position and I am very happy. I'm making more than junior faculty at the school where I did my undergrad or PhD and I only work 40 hours a week.
Damn_registrars has no butt-hole. Damn_registrars has no use for a butt-hole.
The answer is fuck'n easy. Write software and make a shitload more money than your scientist brethren.
is there's no choice at all. All you have to do is show up at your primary. Do you have any idea how much power there is a in a primary vote? Jeff Sessions just shut his career down because he's going to lose his primary challenge (sadly he's being replaced by an even bigger nutter, since the voters know Sessions isn't helping them but they don't yet know what else to do, so they're doubling down on right wing politics).
Show up at your primaries and vote for the most left leaning candidate you can. If everybody did that we'd have Bernie Sanders for president.
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It's been this way since the 90's, possibly earlier.
love is just extroverted narcissism
Recycling Reddit's aggregated content - now within 24 hours!
If people stop going for PhDs, what criteria will Google use to cut the pile of applicants for their job openings?
This space for rent. All reasonable inquiries will be entertained at proprietors discretion.
plenty of opportunities in this hot new growing field.
I got a PhD 10 years ago at a state university. I never ever wanted to be a professor. I got a PhD because it was marginally more work than a masters. When I looked around at others in the program they fit a few profiles:
I don't want to leave school to get a real job, so I keep going.
I'm a foreign student and am getting an american degree.
I couldn't get a job, so I'll keep going to differentiate myself.
I don't think a single person was I'm top of my class, curious into research and academia and want to be come a professor. Maybe this is slightly different at top tier universities, but I think people see Ph.D as a differentiator and not to prepare you for academia.
1. Declare the sky is falling due to (something you can blame on humans) ....
2. Get someone to fund your long-range study.
3.
4. Profit! (Or at least have permanent employment and probably tenure.)
Unfortunately, most of them have already been picked:
http://dailysignal.com/2009/11...
Although there is a strong second-order field opening up, like "how the ocean ate my global warming expectations" or better, "attribution science" where your entire existence is about proving how weather = climate, as long as it's bad, of course.
https://www.pbs.org/newshour/t...
(braces self for predictable -infinity, Troll moderation)
-Styopa
You do know that many if not most people can not vote in primaries?
1) You have to be registered in that party in many (including large) states. You often have to register a year or more in advance, before you have any idea which primary (if any) matters.
2) If you do register and vote in one primary you are locked out of the others in most places.
The real problem is that political parties, especially as they currently operate, are blatantly unconstitutional - they deny the right to vote to many if not most citizens. To say nothing of their countless other illegal and immoral activities.
BTW: That is why Trump won. Because a lot of us who wanted to vote for Sanders were locked out and had no choice but to try and blow up the corrupt, illegal, unconstitutional system. That approach may still work.
> will land a permanent staff position at a university
I have no doubt it's dire, but it's a bit of misleading statistic. Most academic positions are relatively short-term contracts, often 2-3 years.
Look, the article makes a view that all those who seek PhDs not only want to go into tenure-track academia, but will continue to want to do so.
And it conflates working in top-tier academic tenure with working in academia at the college and non-tenure tracks.
And it presumes, that after ten years in academia being paid half of what industry pays, they won't want to switch to corporate with some academic participation (e.g. associate faculty at nearby locations, institute work with campus seminars, or more contract based academic participation combined with spurts of other stints).
This would be like me telling you that everyone who wants to become a medical specialist PhD/MD will wish to continue doing this or will, in fact, succeed in completing this.
But it's still far more likely than making it in a sports career.
Your path is your path. Sometimes it changes. Sometimes you realize the stuff you like to do is not what you thought it would be, so you shift to a more rewarding career, both monetarily and professionally. Sometimes you become a scientific advisor, or write books, or take up professional surfing.
-- Tigger warning: This post may contain tiggers! --
Look, the article makes a view that all those who seek PhDs not only want to go into tenure-track academia, but will continue to want to do so.
In many fields (e.g. many subfields in biology), the only jobs that utilize the PhD are in academia. Basically, you get the PhD, do the post-doc(s), fail to land a permanent academic job (e.g. tenured professor), and then have to basically start all over with a new career.
I knew the creimer trolls were bananas. I didn't think that they were this sleazy.
The science job system is broken. The main problem is the federal subsidy of Graduate Student Stipends and Postdoctoral Fellowship salaries from grants. This has led to the situation of an oversupply of bright people in what amount to full time jobs with no benefits with little chance to achieve a rare faculty post. The fix is to stop the subsidy. Institutions need to take on fewer graduate students, pay them more and train them fully. Bolster the Master's degree for the less committed. The Postdoc should be eliminated and replaced with the term Contract Researcher which should be treated like a job. These people should be paid market rates so they can move to whomever is smart enough to get a grant.
For the kids out there, the current system is a sort of feudal concoction built to maximize imperious egos and is fundamentally exploitive.
Advise: go into science if you have the desire. Go to a good undergraduate school but if you do not get into one of the best institutions for grad school DO NOT GO.
It's that bad out there and it's winner take all.
Science is a rewarding profession but the hardest thing to understand is that even if you do everything right your career can still fail so you have to be brave. You also have to have GENERAL/VERSATILE knowledge to adapt with the times.
The parent article is predicated on the assumption that Science equates with dollars for science. Once basic science in an area is well formed it becomes technology and society has no compelling reason to keep paying for it. Tenured faculty who continue to burn out grad students working on subjects "understood" decades ago are part of the problem here.
Finally: biology is a vast frontier but the NIH wants cures. You don't have to fully understand cancer to kill it.
Copying and pasting comments from a deleted account doesn't prove anything. Wait... Scratch that. It does prove that you're an idiot.
You know how I can tell this totally isn't creimer
Cause creimer is an open book who doesn't care what we say about him. He tells us about it all the time.
Rememer when you tried to dox a tokyo cafe maid? That was one of my favorite times that it wasn't creimer.
https://slashdot.org/comments....
What happened to the shortage of STEM majors?
Make them do something useful for once! Science is BULLSHIT!!
Not everyone is getting a PhD in French Literature, Poetry, or Anthropology.
That said, people forget that a PhD merely means you are able to teach yourself, and teach others, and publish academic papers or books on at least one subject. Theoretically, at least, you're supposed to be able to learn a new field of study and teach it as well. I've seen examples of PhDs who teach college in other countries in fields that are not their own original focus. Some of the best faculty and post-docs have done this.
It's like an engineering PhD who studied fossil fuel extraction (oil, LNG, CNG, coal, etc) not adapting to a downturn in fossil fuels. Many could easily transition to biofuels, and other related fields of study.
I'm not saying it would be easy, but that's the basic concept, and why most Doctorates are literally "Doctor of Philosophy" in the sciences. You're trained to think, formulate, research, learn, and then teach.
-- Tigger warning: This post may contain tiggers! --
It was particularly bad for me. Friends and family and random strangers pumped up my ego since leaving high school, using terms like, "creme-de-la-creme" "got through JEE? life is made man!". Then ended up in a PhD program in hypersonic flow when that baldie with a blotchy birthmark pulled perestroika and glasnost out of a hat and dissolved USSR. Having defeated the enemy USA cashed in its peace dividend, which essentially meant all those PhDs in hypersonic rocket science are totally surplus. People with 10 and 20 year experience in hypersonic CFD were coming around begging for temp positions. People whose papers I used to read with great reverence and admiration were standing in line ahead of me fighting for a 12 month post doc position.
Visa running out, with a baby, all those non creme-de-la-creme were all on great jobs and career path ... never felt more depressed.
Then, finally, the waves of economic growth finally lapped up on that isolated island I was marooned in. Feb 1994. Worst month in life. March 1994. Had three job offers, three count them, one, two, three! Purely lucked into taking up an offer from a startup just on the verge of take off and IPO.
But, it was luck. Not perseverance, not hard work, not impossibly high IQ, not my careful career choices. Bad luck followed by good luck. That is all it was. L.U.C.K.
sed -e 's/Chuck Norris/Rajnikant/g' joke > fact
I had to dig this up:
http://blogs.lse.ac.uk/impactofsocialsciences/2013/12/11/how-academia-resembles-a-drug-gang/
If it's deleted, how come it's still up, Chris? It's trivially easy to link you and all your user accounts. I see you are paying more attention to your crammar now.
The university system is one of the biggest scams of all time and has stolen untold trillions of productive economic activity from the work force. It is artificially inflated by government manipulation via student loans. The economics are catching up, these universities will start to go bankrupt, and it will be glorious.
Actually I am a cancer researcher who has published in all the areas you just rattled off so yeah...idiot. /.
You did help me with one thing, I've used this website since the beginning and it is now dominated by uncivil discourse.
Got better things to do.
Goodbye forever
Chris living in his imaginary world again which most people find weird, twisted and absurd and which Chris accepts as being perfectly normal.
---
Nancy Guerrero
Director
Special Education
Santa Clara County Office of Education
Creimer, you illiterate ameba,
My first name is: Lill
My last name is: Yayako
You definitely have to get your meds input regulated. You are furtherly loosing it as we speak, just as Silvia Bunge and Nancy Guerrero have mentioned here.
Creimer lives in the imaginary world of mangas. That's why he thought that Ayako was more common than Yayako.
---
Silvia Bunge
Psychology Department
Berkeley University
Postdoc in math here. Most people with a PhD in progress already either already know they want to do something else besides academia or are unsure, so the numbers aren't that grim.
On the flipside, those that do want to go into academia are still facing an incredibly hard time. In math, there are about 200 permanent, reasonable positions that actually let you do research and there are at least 700 people applying for them.
The sad thing is, a huge factor that determines whether you get such a position is not how hard you work or how smart you are, but rather if you manage to get into just the right popular area and clique. And believe me, this has little or nothing to do with how valuable your research might be to society.
"What lies behind us, and what lies before us are tiny matters compared to what lies within us." Ralph Waldo Emerson
That's life
It's not rosy in China either
With many newly minted Ph.D looking for work, some went on to sell pork in local wet markets
That varies a bit. One of my friends was a biology postdoc, but quit academia to move to a big pharma company. Her starting salary was about 50% higher than she had been making and she had the funds to recruit a small team to work for her. She's definitely still using her biology PhD, but she's no longer in the academic track (though she is still publishing, so could return without much difficulty if she wants to).
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We have an over-supply because we offer foreign students these options. This should be ended. We don't need foreign workers, who usually have problems with English, and are never better than US workers.
Do you want fries wit dat Mac?
Oh wait, that's the punch line for English majors.
Tracy Johnson
Old fashioned text games hosted below:
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BT
and you're trying to hold onto the standard of living you've had as your wages have stagnated. Yes, somebody in that bracket can downsize. Sell their home and start running a 2-3 hour commute. Buy an economy car. Stop taking vacations. Eating crap food.
Yeah, somebody in that income bracket has a lot further down to go, but they're still going down. When you start talking about tax raises you lose them and their vote. This is exactly how the ruling elite keep us at each other's throats. Whatever you have you're always just barely hanging on to it. That's the essence of 'Conservative'. It's a kind of desperation that leads to easily exploitable fear.
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