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A successful academic faces lifelong debt

chronicle.com

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Re: A successful academic faces lifelong debt

#41

Post by anigbrowl »

tptacek wrote: post #39
anigbrowl wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How dare you. This person did work to get where she is - did you miss all the stuff about working as a waitress and a cleaner? Obviously, you don't consider Native American studies valuable because it's a field with limited commercial application. And so you equate this perceived lack of value with a lack of willingness on her part to do any work, a faulty syllogism if ever I've seen one. I understand that you believ…

Her field of study is an unwise economic choice. That part of the comment you're replying to isn't an opinion.

I'd have to see the college accounts before I'd concede that. If it is so lacking in value, I wonder how come it was so expensive for her to obtain her PhD?

Re: A successful academic faces lifelong debt

#42

Post by yummyfajitas »

anigbrowl wrote: post #33
yummyfajitas wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, doing whatever you want regardless of it's commercial viability is a privilege reserved for the affluent. Perhaps one day we will become so wealthy that robots do all the work, and people don't have to do anything they don't like. Until then, most of us need to do work that benefits others in order to survive.

I think her work probably does benefit others. Maybe the benefits of teaching the history and situation of a defeated indigenous culture are not all that tangible, but I suggest that that is in part due to a weakness in our social mechanism of assigning value. The implication (probably unintentional) of your suggestion is that we'd be better off as a society if this subject weren't even available for study (since peo…

Her work does not benefit others very much as demonstrated by their revealed preferences: no one is willing to pay her much for her teaching.

I'm saying that we'd be better off as a society if most people who want to become scholars in Native American Studies don't do it, and become nurses instead. Less fun for them, but great for those of us who want the services of a nurse more than the services of a professor. We compensate them for the lack of fun with money.

Re: A successful academic faces lifelong debt

#43

Post by tptacek »

anigbrowl wrote: post #41
tptacek wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Her field of study is an unwise economic choice. That part of the comment you're replying to isn't an opinion.

I'd have to see the college accounts before I'd concede that. If it is so lacking in value, I wonder how come it was so expensive for her to obtain her PhD?

What does one thing have to do with the other? People make irrational economic choices all the time.

Re: A successful academic faces lifelong debt

#44

Post by tptacek »

anigbrowl wrote: post #38
cynicalkane wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I know you were being sarcastic, but this is 100% true. Doing what you love, instead of what is useful, is a privilege, not a right.

And yet persistent threads in entrepreneurial discussions on HN is 'find your passion, the follow it' and 'make something great, if you build it they will come'. I agree with these ideas, the whole point of a large open economy (and one that is compounded by the internet) is that there's a market for everything and if you're really good at what you do then you'll get by. The point of meritocracy is to reward excellen…

Just because there's a market for everything doesn't mean there's a living wage attached to every possible activity. I think you're getting yourself a little tangled up here.

Re: A successful academic faces lifelong debt

#45

Post by sschronk »

anigbrowl wrote: post #27
patio11 wrote: post #2

Maybe being an assistant professor of Native American studies is a lifestyle choice to be indulged in by people who are either married to or descended from people who did commercially valuable work? The engineering department has spots available for us kids who have to work for a living.

How dare you. This person did work to get where she is - did you miss all the stuff about working as a waitress and a cleaner? Obviously, you don't consider Native American studies valuable because it's a field with limited commercial application. And so you equate this perceived lack of value with a lack of willingness on her part to do any work, a faulty syllogism if ever I've seen one. I understand that you believ…

Yes it has.

That's a major problem with the attitude in our country. Greed has overtaken our senses and everyone thinks they are entitled.

Even when you look at the number of students in each major, you will see a very disproportionate number of students majoring in subjects just for the money with a disregard for their talent in the field.

Re: A successful academic faces lifelong debt

#46

Post by scott_s »

anigbrowl wrote: post #41
tptacek wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Her field of study is an unwise economic choice. That part of the comment you're replying to isn't an opinion.

I'd have to see the college accounts before I'd concede that. If it is so lacking in value, I wonder how come it was so expensive for her to obtain her PhD?

Because, as a liberal arts student, she probably didn't have much in the way of assistanceships or scholarships. Most science and engineering students are supported through teaching assistanceships, research assistanceships or fellowships from outside her school. Those pay both tuition and a modest salary.

Re: A successful academic faces lifelong debt

#47

Post by scott_s »

anigbrowl wrote: post #27
patio11 wrote: post #2

Maybe being an assistant professor of Native American studies is a lifestyle choice to be indulged in by people who are either married to or descended from people who did commercially valuable work? The engineering department has spots available for us kids who have to work for a living.

How dare you. This person did work to get where she is - did you miss all the stuff about working as a waitress and a cleaner? Obviously, you don't consider Native American studies valuable because it's a field with limited commercial application. And so you equate this perceived lack of value with a lack of willingness on her part to do any work, a faulty syllogism if ever I've seen one. I understand that you believ…

You misinterpreted his last sentence. He didn't mean "I work for a living, you don't."

He meant "Since both of us come from backgrounds which requires us to work to get through school, we need to pick areas of study that will pay enough to support us."

Re: A successful academic faces lifelong debt

#48

Post by scott_s »

weaksauce wrote: post #14
hegemonicon wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's what I'd like to know - how LITTLE does an assistant professor make that 60,000 dollars of debt will take a lifetime to pay off, even in the absence of a mortgage (and presumably a car) payment?

according to the chronicle the average assistant professor salary is ~$80k. I doubt that a native american studies assistant professor will get that much but I have been wrong before. http://chronicle.com/stats/aaup/index.php?action=result&...

That averages the science and engineering professors with the liberal arts professors. At my school, I know the starting salary for a CS professor is going to be around $85k. But looking at the History department, I see some assistant professors as low as $52k.

See: http://www.collegiatetimes.com/databases/salaries/salary?nam...

Re: A successful academic faces lifelong debt

#49

Post by anigbrowl »

yummyfajitas wrote: post #42
anigbrowl wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think her work probably does benefit others. Maybe the benefits of teaching the history and situation of a defeated indigenous culture are not all that tangible, but I suggest that that is in part due to a weakness in our social mechanism of assigning value. The implication (probably unintentional) of your suggestion is that we'd be better off as a society if this subject weren't even available for study (since peo…

Her work does not benefit others very much as demonstrated by their revealed preferences: no one is willing to pay her much for her teaching. I'm saying that we'd be better off as a society if most people who want to become scholars in Native American Studies don't do it, and become nurses instead. Less fun for them, but great for those of us who want the services of a nurse more than the services of a professor. We…

Again, your syllogism is faulty. You assume her work is fairly valued in exact proportion to the income it generates. But what of the possibility that her department's revenues subsidize the high cost of other departments, such as physics labs or in-demand business speakers?

It's not cheap to participate in a program like this, especially not at a decent school. If there was very low demand, you would expect this to be cheaper, no? http://www.stateuniversity.com/program/05-0202/American-Indi...

I can't get with your thesis that she's being poorly paid because she's choosing to have more fun. It sounds as if she's worked extremely hard to get to the academic level she is at. And if you sample people, I imagine that most would expect that a professorship at an ivy-league university would pay well, since you have to be at or near the top of your field to land such a job.

Re: A successful academic faces lifelong debt

#50

Post by defen »

jnovek wrote: post #24
cynicalkane wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I know you were being sarcastic, but this is 100% true. Doing what you love, instead of what is useful, is a privilege, not a right.

Do you do what you love? Then you must be very lucky. I know that I thank my lucky stars every day that what I love doing also happens to be fabulously lucrative. It disgusts me that we live in one of the most wealthy societies in the world and arbitrary criteria, such as the class or gender you were born with, still determine much about your ability to succeed in and enjoy life. Rhetorical question of self-examinati…

> how would you feel if she were a math professor instead? Being an academic mathematician is just as self-indulgent as anything in the humanities.

The academic mathematician who wants to make more money can probably get a job in industry, or learn an in-demand skill such as programming, stats, etc. An assistant professor of Native American studies probably doesn't have the same capacity (to put it bluntly: is not as smart), so it was a much bigger gamble for her to take on so much debt to become a professor.

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