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A glut of PhDs who can’t find academic jobs

theguardian.com

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Re: A glut of PhDs who can’t find academic jobs

#51

Post by angersock »

chrisseaton wrote: post #9
pacala wrote: post #4

The PhD system is a Ponzi scheme. First and foremost, a PhD program trains one to become a professor. During a professor career, one is expected to graduate 5, 10, 20 PhD students. It is mathematically impossible for the majority of these students to find a professor job. The explosion of higher education, internally and globally, masks the problem to some extent, just like a good old fashioned Ponzi scheme appears s…

> First and foremost, a PhD program trains one to become a professor. No it doesn't! It trains you to be a researcher. You can be a researcher without being a professor.

Ah, but you can be a researcher (doing work at least as good as most PhDs) without a PhD.

Therein lies the rub.

Re: A glut of PhDs who can’t find academic jobs

#52

Post by anon946 »

mikebenfield wrote: post #32
krastanov wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Quite certainly, becoming a professor is not "first and foremost" what PhD leads to (nor is it what many people do it for). It is certainly not my experience. I am a PhD student and since the very beginning my mentors (program directors, my PhD advisor, committee members) have been pretty clear about future prospects: "the opportunities in industry are such and such (compared to the opportunities for BS and MS)", "po…

I think this varies somewhat by field, but I promise you, in many fields essentially the only reason to get a PhD is for a career in academia. The idea of a someone in graduate school not aspiring to become a professor still sounds odd to me. And while I never had anyone outright lie to me or tell me job prospects were great, there were also few people who gave me a really clear picture of just how bad they were.

I'd say it varies more than somewhat, but rather a lot, by field (and maybe by school).

Re: A glut of PhDs who can’t find academic jobs

#53

Post by School-Cotton »

santaclaus wrote: post #40
dv_dt wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think this is more of an indictment of how little real investment goes into R&D at private industry - even as the companies merge into megopolies who should have the finances to best justify it, they seem to become even less inclined to invest in fundamental research.

The big (and some even not-so-big) companies hire lots of PhDs -- roughly 8% of Google's employees have doctorates.

That doesn't imply that all those people needed a PhD for their job, though. I worked with multiple people at Amazon who had PhDs who were doing the exact same job I was.

Re: A glut of PhDs who can’t find academic jobs

#54

Post by throw-away-8 »

bjd2385 wrote: post #47
pacala wrote: post #4

The PhD system is a Ponzi scheme. First and foremost, a PhD program trains one to become a professor. During a professor career, one is expected to graduate 5, 10, 20 PhD students. It is mathematically impossible for the majority of these students to find a professor job. The explosion of higher education, internally and globally, masks the problem to some extent, just like a good old fashioned Ponzi scheme appears s…

More like the entire higher education system. This is what happens when businessmen run an education system and not True academics.

What does an education system have to do with academics? It makes way more sense when educators provide education and education managers run the system.

Re: A glut of PhDs who can’t find academic jobs

#55

Post by School-Cotton »

yeukhon wrote: post #44

I come from a city university, and in my experience many of the master students there (information system or computer science program) are not up to standard when they leave the program (i.e. they can't really program, let alone with theories). I think this is the problem with my school, but when I had this conversation with an old friend he felt that his master classes focused on theory, very little room for program…

I assume you get downvoted because theoretical CS research really doesn't need to involve coding, so it's not as odd as you seem to think.

Re: A glut of PhDs who can’t find academic jobs

#56

Post by sigstoat »

nether wrote: post #42
pacala wrote: post #4

The PhD system is a Ponzi scheme. First and foremost, a PhD program trains one to become a professor. During a professor career, one is expected to graduate 5, 10, 20 PhD students. It is mathematically impossible for the majority of these students to find a professor job. The explosion of higher education, internally and globally, masks the problem to some extent, just like a good old fashioned Ponzi scheme appears s…

We could build new universities. Take up the slack in all the excess PhD's, increasing the supply of good secondary education, and help stave off exploding tuition costs. Build it from scratch like Carnegie Mellon, Stanford, or Olin. Who is "we"? I dunno, some rich guy maybe.

and each department at said university will employ what, 20-30 PhDs in each department? who themselves will then go on to produce a pile of new PhDs in their career?

at what rate would new universities have to be constructed in order for this to do anything meaningful about the issue?

Re: A glut of PhDs who can’t find academic jobs

#57

Post by computerex »

apersona wrote: post #14
frozenport wrote: post #5

>>Despite our moans about hours of work, pay, and pensions, being an academic is still the best job in the world for those of a particular temperament and talents. I have a slave temperment and enjoy being hauranged by my PI? My talents include falsifying experiments and writing endless papers about how our method is superior to all other methods? Yet we, much like the communist revolutions in the 20th century, have…

Have you actually been in a PhD program?

Ad hominem much?

Re: A glut of PhDs who can’t find academic jobs

#58

Post by spaceseaman »

anon946 wrote: post #52
mikebenfield wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think this varies somewhat by field, but I promise you, in many fields essentially the only reason to get a PhD is for a career in academia. The idea of a someone in graduate school not aspiring to become a professor still sounds odd to me. And while I never had anyone outright lie to me or tell me job prospects were great, there were also few people who gave me a really clear picture of just how bad they were.

I'd say it varies more than somewhat, but rather a lot, by field (and maybe by school).

And even advisor - some have clear paths directly into industry jobs.

Re: A glut of PhDs who can’t find academic jobs

#59

Post by pm90 »

yeukhon wrote: post #44

I come from a city university, and in my experience many of the master students there (information system or computer science program) are not up to standard when they leave the program (i.e. they can't really program, let alone with theories). I think this is the problem with my school, but when I had this conversation with an old friend he felt that his master classes focused on theory, very little room for program…

A PhD does not guarantee good programming skills. I think you are mistaken in assuming that and hence get downvoted.

I have personally found most people who finish/almost finish their PhD's to be very good in describing problems, approaching solutions from different paradigms and articulating their thinking in writing. If you're trying to hire a PhD for a programming job, in most cases you WILL be disappointed.

That said usually they are fast learners and can quickly pick up good programming skill pretty quickly. (Its not as hard as people imagine it to be).

I was planning on doing a PhD but left after my Masters precisely because I wanted to improve my programming skills, which I knew the PhD didn't care much about.

Re: A glut of PhDs who can’t find academic jobs

#60

Post by Cyph0n »

angersock wrote: post #51
chrisseaton wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> First and foremost, a PhD program trains one to become a professor. No it doesn't! It trains you to be a researcher. You can be a researcher without being a professor.

Ah, but you can be a researcher (doing work at least as good as most PhDs) without a PhD. Therein lies the rub.

You can also be a good, e.g., mechanical engineer without getting an engineering degree, but this is an exception to the rule.

Also, companies use the degree as an indicator of skill, so the good engineer who doesn't have a degree needs to somehow reliably demonstrate a solid understanding of the field to compensate. Obviously, from the company's point of view, one is easier to deal with than the other.

The same applies to PhDs and research. A PhD proves that the person has followed through with and understood a very precise topic of research for 2-3 years.

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