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Goodbye Academia

anothersb.blogspot.co.uk

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Re: Goodbye Academia

#91

Post by amark »

mynewwork wrote: post #64
plg wrote: post #47

Yet another worrying sign is that at my university (and I've heard similar stories from colleagues at others) is now deciding that instead of hiring 2 or 3 junior faculty positions (new academics straight out of a postdoc into their first faculty job), instead the priority is to spend the same money on one mid-career "poach" from a competing institution. Double the salary, and bigger startup package. Their rationale…

Most are making 5x to 7x? If we estimate that a professor in a low-paid field makes maybe $60k (ignoring the possibility of grants to pay for additional salary during the summer) this would mean most of your high school friends are now making $300k to $420k. It's rare that most of a high school or college's students go on to become 1 percenters.

He said contemporaries, not friends. Meaning that other successful PHDs/Scientists that put in the same amount of work that he did, but in the private sector, are making that much money.

Re: Goodbye Academia

#92

Post by amark »

santaclaus wrote: post #75
plg wrote: post #47

Yet another worrying sign is that at my university (and I've heard similar stories from colleagues at others) is now deciding that instead of hiring 2 or 3 junior faculty positions (new academics straight out of a postdoc into their first faculty job), instead the priority is to spend the same money on one mid-career "poach" from a competing institution. Double the salary, and bigger startup package. Their rationale…

That seems like an unusually low salary, then. Let's pick a major public research university in the US and a department, say Physics UT Austin (feel free to play the same game with data from another public and another department, like CS at UC Berkeley). Browsing through professor salaries [1], by the time Professors hit tenure they are approaching or breaking 100K a year. Five to seven times this is 500-700K a year!…

Nobody gets tenure anymore. Most stay as associate professors, and make 60-70k.

Re: Goodbye Academia

#93

Post by pseut »

shas3 wrote: post #42
naterator wrote: post #4

These kinds of things are daily discussions in laboratories all over the world. Everyone knows there's no future in academia, and so everyone is looking for an exit plan. I actively discourage people from doing a PhD. Academia is a horrible feudalistic system that doesn't pay well enough to keep the bright minds it attracts. There is no sense in being a post-doc for life. Much better to take that hedge fund job. The…

> I actively discourage people from doing a PhD. Academia is a horrible feudalistic system that doesn't pay well enough to keep the bright minds it attracts. There is no sense in being a post-doc for life. Much better to take that hedge fund job. Underlying your comment is the assumption that every one wants the hedge fund (or other) job. One of the allures of academia is the prospect of doing fundamental research. Y…

>Underlying your comment is the assumption that every one wants the hedge fund (or other) job. One of the allures of academia is the prospect of doing fundamental research. You ignore that many people derive satisfaction from doing fundamental research that has the potential to be widely used across the research community (and possibly, for product development, e.g. industry labs, some government labs).

I assume that those people are unlikely to be discouraged, especially those that are stubborn and motivated enough to complete the degree. So I also actively discourage people from doing a PhD, even though I like my job.

Re: Goodbye Academia

#94

Post by dnautics »

irollboozers wrote: post #87
dnautics wrote: post #55

I quit my second postdoc to launch a nonprofit research institute (we did not get funding, and are retrying later this year). I currently drive for lyft - and make more money than I did as a postdoc, with far fewer hours and better working conditions. This makes economic sense; it's not clear to me that what I was doing as a scientist was really doing society any good, at least as a late night driver I'm 1) giving pe…

The question is - would you continue to do science if you could remove all of the current broken system? Is doing science what you love? Is it possible that there can be a way to continue doing science without being a part of that machine?

answer:

http://indysci.org/projectmarilyn

Re: Goodbye Academia

#95

Post by acbergan »

Balgair wrote: post #88

My brother is leaving industry and going into the ivory tower later this year. He says that it's not just the DoD or the academy, its all government funding. He says the PhD is like a union card now. Lockheed just fired 4000 people[0] and NASA's average age is about 53 [1]. The entire DoD is aging and about to retire, with no-one in the 25-50 year old range, effectively. You'd think that they would then start hiring…

Strictly anecdotal, but NASA is hiring and they are looking for young engineers either straight out of graduate school or with a couple years of experience. From what I understand it's something like one hire for every 3 that retire though.

Re: Goodbye Academia

#96

Post by trentmb »

scott_s wrote: post #90
shas3 wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The analogy does not make sense. I know many colleagues who got into academia and were able to find plenty of funding. It wasn't a lucky break that helped them, but hard work and talent. The system is far from perfect, but it is not 'feudal', etc. as the parent comment claims. Systematic hard work can get you results in academia. From what I understand about show-biz, it requires a lot more than just talent and hard…

I got a PhD in computer science, and I landed a research job in industry where I get to do both research and development. So, half production, half academia. I consider myself extraordinarily lucky. I can point to many different instances of luck that enabled me to be where I am now. Hard work and talent are a given, but among those that work hard and are talented, there's a lot of blind luck that determines who gets…

Research in CS (and math) is 'cheap' compared to research in say, chemistry, physics, or biology.

Pencil, paper, and maybe some Amazon EC2 time as opposed to a bunch of lab equipment and other materials.

Re: Goodbye Academia

#97

Post by bradleyjg »

larrys wrote: post #89
shas3 wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The analogy does not make sense. I know many colleagues who got into academia and were able to find plenty of funding. It wasn't a lucky break that helped them, but hard work and talent. The system is far from perfect, but it is not 'feudal', etc. as the parent comment claims. Systematic hard work can get you results in academia. From what I understand about show-biz, it requires a lot more than just talent and hard…

"Systematic hard work can get you results in academia. From what I understand about show-biz, it requires a lot more than just talent and hard work." Agree (in that what you are saying makes sense. I don't have unfortunately (or maybe I should say fortunately) have personal experience in those particular job markets.) In any case they appear to be pyramid type systems of success [1](and for that matter athletics are…

It's called the tournament model. Big law firms are the classic example.

A related theory is that technology and globalization has, and will, make more and more industries 'winner take all'.

Re: Goodbye Academia

#98

Post by fennecfoxen »

ForHackernews wrote: post #29
a3voices wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I didn't downvote you, but WhatsApp affects more people than obscure scientific research.

WhatsApp is just cheap text messages. If we had a sane telecom market to start with, SMS would already cost nearly nothing and there'd be no market for WhatsApp. They've done a good job filling a niche in a broken market, and delivered real value for consumers, I admit.

Monopoly profits don't get redistributed back into the consumer surplus all by themselves. Somebody's got to do it.

Re: Goodbye Academia

#99

Post by a_bonobo »

burntsushi wrote: post #71
eykanal wrote: post #9

This is almost exactly my story as well. One point he doesn't mention is that there are many interesting problems in the "real world". Lots of academics just point to industry in general and say, "no freedom, no thanks." I've held a few jobs and all of them presented with unique, interesting, and challenging problems. I've had the freedom to choose my own approach to solving problems and met up with other academic-mi…

I'm currently in the middle of a PhD, and you've touched on the exact fear I have. I intend on finding a job in industry after I graduate, and the biggest fear I have is a restriction on freedom. I totally get that there are jobs out there that still give you some amount of freedom to pick your own tools and/or approach a problem in your own way. Every now and then, I casually leaf through job ads and I have no idea…

Ask your supervisor if (s)he supports you doing an industry project for a month, (s)he might even get you a position with collaborators.

I worked with a huge crop science company for four weeks and got some valuable insights (mostly, I had to justify every little step, and the local boss was a huge fan of micromanagement: meetings, meetings a few a day. But they did have a lot of money and were willing to throw it at possibly not profitable projects; and people did proper 9-5, not 9-5678910 like academia)

Re: Goodbye Academia

#100

Post by Balgair »

acbergan wrote: post #95
Balgair wrote: post #88

My brother is leaving industry and going into the ivory tower later this year. He says that it's not just the DoD or the academy, its all government funding. He says the PhD is like a union card now. Lockheed just fired 4000 people[0] and NASA's average age is about 53 [1]. The entire DoD is aging and about to retire, with no-one in the 25-50 year old range, effectively. You'd think that they would then start hiring…

Strictly anecdotal, but NASA is hiring and they are looking for young engineers either straight out of graduate school or with a couple years of experience. From what I understand it's something like one hire for every 3 that retire though.

Thanks for the info there. 1/3 replacement leaves a ghost town.
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