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Science PhDs Have Very Low Jobless Rates
- iqster 16y agoYes ... us scientists have an awesome life. We get to implant cameras in the backs of our head (http://gothamist.com/2010/12/03/video_photos_nyu_prof_installs_came.php http://gothamist.com/2010/12/03/video_photos_nyu_prof_instal...). Truly the good life!!
- bartonfink 16y agoThat dude is an art professor if I recall right from the posting the other day.
- iqster 16y agoFair enough ... I have a PhD in CS (recent). I make it a point to warn people it is not the good life profs and stupid articles make it out to be.
- iuygtfrikuj 16y agoWhat proportion of those jobs are below minimum wage post-doc positions? The unemployment rate for panhandlers is also very low, very few of them face redundancy
- yummyfajitas 16y agoWhat proportion of those jobs are below minimum wage post-doc positions? Probably not very many. Typical postdoc pay is $40-60k/year depending on where the job is located ($40k in Urbana-Champaigne, $60k NYC or Chicago). That's about 2-4x lower than what the postdoc could get in the outside world, but it's a far cry from minimum wage.
- timr 16y ago"Typical postdoc pay is $40-60k/year depending on where the job is located ($40k in Urbana-Champaigne, $60k NYC or Chicago)." I say thee "Ha!", sir. The offers I was getting for post-docs were consistently on or below the low end of that range, even in San Francisco (which ain't cheap). Probably one of the biggest nudges I had away from academia was the realization that as a post-doc, I'd have a lower standard of living than I did as a graduate student. It didn't seem like a smart trend to follow.
- yummyfajitas 16y agoWow, I guess my experience (in applied math/computational science) was atypical. I didn't get a single offer below $45k, and the only person I know who took less than that was working in New Zealand. I guess applied math is the place to be if you want to stay in academia.
- timr 16y agoit probably helps to work in an area with "applied" in the name. ;-)
- stevenbedrick 16y agoIt also varies widely by funding agency. NIH-funded postdocs are paid abysmally small amounts; DARPA or industrially-funded postdocs can pay quite a bit more reasonably.
- ylem 16y agoI'll echo that that depends very much on funding source. For some university postdocs, it is around $35K, for NIH postdocs, it's less than $50K. Given that the typical postdoc has done a PhD for 5-7 years and many people do two postdocs, it is something to consider. For example, the typical biologist gets her first from NIH at 42....Then, there are those that don't find employment using their science skills, but percolate into other industries (consulting, finance, etc.). I think it's a great lifestyle for those that succeed, but it is extremely competitive--finding faculty positions has also gotten harder due to contracted state funding of universities...
- iuygtfrikuj 16y ago$40K for a how many hour week?
- narkee 16y agoSo P(jobless|PhD) = 0.017, whereas P(jobless) = 0.066 According to Baye's Theorem, the P(PhD|jobless) = P(jobless|PhD)*P(PhD)/P(jobless) Where according to [1], P(PhD) = 0.01 (for all PhDs) so assuming roughly half are science, P(PhD) = 0.005, and we get P(PhD|jobless) = 0.0013, or 0.13%, which means that roughly 1 out of every 1000 jobless people has a PhD. [1]http://factfinder.census.gov/servlet/QTTable?_bm=y&-geo_id=01000US&-qr_name=DEC_2000_SF3_U_QTP20&-ds_name=DEC_2000_SF3_U&-redoLog=false http://factfinder.census.gov/servlet/QTTable?_bm=y&-geo_...
- grn 16y agoBayes' theorem states that P(A|B) = P(B|A) * P(A) / P(B), so in this case it says P(PhD|jobless) = P(jobless|PhD) * P(PhD) / P(jobless). It seems that you stated it incorrectly but used the correct version in the computation (the incorrect gives 0.2244).
- narkee 16y agoRight, good catch there - it was a sloppy typo.
- madcaptenor 16y agoBut who cares about P(PhD|jobless)? P(jobless|PhD) is important; it's a measure of how much job security a PhD leads to. But P(PhD|jobless) is only important if you're a jobless PhD and you want to know what your chances of finding someone else who's survived grad school in the unemployment line. I wouldn't know how to interpret "1 out of every n jobless people has a PhD"; the first thing I'd ask is "what proportion of all people have a PhD", and then essentially run things through a crude mental version of Bayes' theorem. (I have a PhD. In probability.)
- btilly 16y agoP(jobless|PhD) is important; it's a measure of how much job security a PhD leads to. No, it is a measure of how much job security a PhD is correlated with. I believe that the qualities that lead to one being able to complete a PhD are positively correlated with being able to get and hold a job. Therefore you need to restrict to just those people you think could get a PhD to figure out how much the PhD helps or hurts you.
- adaml_623 16y agoScience PhD = Smart + willing to follow orders + conforming + able to focus on something for years. You'd be foolish not to hire one.
- fluidcruft 16y agoYou forgot "successfully kowtows narcissistic bureaucracy" and "tolerates toil" Hire indeed.
- FiReaNG3L 16y agoThe best science PhDs are neither willing to follow orders nor conforming, but you're right about #1 and 4 :)
- falsestprophet 16y agoThe best science PhDs aren't looking for "jobs."
- Semiapies 16y agoBecause genius means you don't need to eat.
- adrianN 16y agoBecause a position as researcher is usually not considered to be a "job".
- Semiapies 16y agoI presume you're not suggesting that working and getting paid are absent from research positions. If so, then who doesn't consider that a "job", and why should we care that they have this bizarre viewpoint?
- deleted 16y ago[deleted]
- mih 16y agoA welcome news considering the value of PhD is being questioned of late. But of course, I speak only for those in STEM subjects.
- geebee 16y agoI'll probably read the whole article, but the first line of the abstract is already losing me: "The unemployment rate for PhDs in science, engineering, and health is about one-fourth that of the general population." Oh, come on, you're comparing this against the general population? People who get PhD's in these subjects are typically great high school students who get into good colleges, major in difficult subject matter with high attrition rates, score high on standardized tests, survive a highly selective admissions process to grad school, spend up to a decade in an immensely difficult academic program with astoundingly high attrition rates compared with elite medicine, dentistry, law, or mba programs, and do some unpaid postdoc work. A low unemployment rate compared to the national average. Gee, now there's a good control group. For a more sobering viewpoint, take a look at a recent RAND study about the employment prospects for scientists and engineers relative to professions: http://www.rand.org/pubs/issue_papers/IP241.html http://www.rand.org/pubs/issue_papers/IP241.html