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This identifies a problem: PhD students are treated badly both in terms of working conditions and pay. The solution isn't to abolish the PhD. It's to have bette

This identifies a problem: PhD students are treated badly both in terms of working conditions and pay. The solution isn't to abolish the PhD. It's to have better working conditions and pay! PhD students should be employees with all of the protections this gives them. They should have unions (I have been both at union and non-union shops, you want to be in a graduate student union). PhD students should benefit from the combination of protections given to students and to employees. Students should get paid a living wage. The problem today is that NIH, NSF, DARPA and others refuse to give us funds to pay students reasonably. I cannot write an NIH grant to pay a PhD student reasonably. Literally. My grant will be rejected because I'm paying too much. I can't pay postdocs what they are worth either for the same reason. For better pay, you need to lobby Congress to beat NIH, NSF, DARPA and others with a big stick until they stop this system of abuse. If you want to end advisor abuse it's simple: PhD students should not be tied to advisors. Under a system where your funding depends on one person, you always suffer from a power imbalance. PhD students should be free agents. When you join, the university promises you 6 years of funding and checks in every 2 years. Go nuts. As for the thesis? Even in STEM a thesis is important. But, what a thesis is has changed. Today you often staple together 5-10 papers that you published. That's great! PhD overproduction?! Nonsense! We don't have nearly enough PhDs. The demand for PhDs in industry is huge across many fields. It's true that in some fields there is too much supply, but there's also an oversupply of people of those majors in general anyway, that's not an issue with the PhD. PhDs are critical for the development of humanity. It's a system that takes a smart person and turns them into a capable smart person who can find hard new problems and solve them. There is absolutely no reason why we can't unionize all PhD students, immunize them from advisor influence, and pay them a living wage.

ImprobableTruth 4y ago
>The demand for PhDs in industry is huge across many fields ... is it really? CS is as far as I know one of the fields with the highest demand and even there the jobs that actually need a phd are pretty rare. As far as I can tell it's possibly only ML where there's a good amount of jobs that essentially require a phd.
- light_hue_1 4y ago
  > ... is it really? CS is as far as I know one of the fields with the highest demand and even there the jobs that actually need a phd are pretty rare. Yes. Although, I don't blame you for being misled by terrible articles about the situation. Historically, departments look at PhDs that go to industry as having pursued "alternate careers" that the only real goal is to stay in academia at all costs. So they talk about them as being failures. Although, that couldn't be further from the truth. STEM PhDs have huge demand. Bio PhDs, CS, Math PhDs, engineering, etc. How you value PhDs also matters. In many fields, a PhD will not net you more money. It will net you a much more interesting job though. In some fields, like ML, it will net you both more money and a more interesting job. But. There is vast vast oversupply of non-STEM PhDs. These departments need to be shut down or completely reformed to stop screwing over their students.
chrisseaton 4y ago
> PhD students should be employees with all of the protections this gives them. I don't understand this point of view. Why do you want to be an employee, working for someone else, with all the obligations and restrictions of that... rather than a student free to pursue what you want and to do it in your own way. If you want to be an employee and to be told what to research, then become a research engineer, don't do a PhD. That's an existing research career that's open to you.
- pca006132 4y ago
  I guess he means with protections provided by employment laws, as there are no laws mandating protections such as annual leave for students? I think extending employment laws to cover graduate students or setup additional laws might be more appropriate.
  - chrisseaton 4y ago
    > there are no laws mandating protections such as annual leave for students? Did I have an unusually permissive advisor or something? My advisor didn’t control my leave - it was up to me to manage my time.
    - pca006132 4y ago
      I have heard that there are some supervisors abusing their students, pushing for progress and insulting them when the progress is not ideal, or even assign tasks unrelated to their research (projects from their company?). Effectively their supervisors are controlling their leave. I guess the current situation really depends on supervisor, so it would be nice if there are laws for students' basic right.
      - chrisseaton 4y ago
        Yeah a third way - if the problem is they're being treated like employees then let's not double-down and legally make them employees.
    - 4y ago
xavxav 4y ago
In France, you normally can't apply for a thesis without funding (it may vary on field though). And the moment you have funding that makes you an employee, with the protections accorded. Since most theses are funded using public money, you become a state employee with all the additional protections that implies. That said, PhD students (and researchers) are still poorly paid (though PhD stipends are being raised over the next few years), and though France has a legal 35 hour work week, informal pressure of academia means that tends to be thrown out the window. There are legal requirements on graduate schools that help protect students from abusive advisors or other abuse within their laboratories, of course since the research world is small, it remains to see how effective they can be.

ImprobableTruth 4y ago

>The demand for PhDs in industry is huge across many fields ... is it really? CS is as far as I know one of the fields with the highest demand and even there the jobs that actually need a phd are pretty rare. As far as I can tell it's possibly only ML where there's a good amount of jobs that essentially require a phd.

light_hue_1 4y ago
> ... is it really? CS is as far as I know one of the fields with the highest demand and even there the jobs that actually need a phd are pretty rare. Yes. Although, I don't blame you for being misled by terrible articles about the situation. Historically, departments look at PhDs that go to industry as having pursued "alternate careers" that the only real goal is to stay in academia at all costs. So they talk about them as being failures. Although, that couldn't be further from the truth. STEM PhDs have huge demand. Bio PhDs, CS, Math PhDs, engineering, etc. How you value PhDs also matters. In many fields, a PhD will not net you more money. It will net you a much more interesting job though. In some fields, like ML, it will net you both more money and a more interesting job. But. There is vast vast oversupply of non-STEM PhDs. These departments need to be shut down or completely reformed to stop screwing over their students.

chrisseaton 4y ago

> PhD students should be employees with all of the protections this gives them. I don't understand this point of view. Why do you want to be an employee, working for someone else, with all the obligations and restrictions of that... rather than a student free to pursue what you want and to do it in your own way. If you want to be an employee and to be told what to research, then become a research engineer, don't do a PhD. That's an existing research career that's open to you.

pca006132 4y ago
I guess he means with protections provided by employment laws, as there are no laws mandating protections such as annual leave for students? I think extending employment laws to cover graduate students or setup additional laws might be more appropriate.
- chrisseaton 4y ago
  > there are no laws mandating protections such as annual leave for students? Did I have an unusually permissive advisor or something? My advisor didn’t control my leave - it was up to me to manage my time.
  - pca006132 4y ago
    I have heard that there are some supervisors abusing their students, pushing for progress and insulting them when the progress is not ideal, or even assign tasks unrelated to their research (projects from their company?). Effectively their supervisors are controlling their leave. I guess the current situation really depends on supervisor, so it would be nice if there are laws for students' basic right.
    - chrisseaton 4y ago
      Yeah a third way - if the problem is they're being treated like employees then let's not double-down and legally make them employees.
  - 4y ago

xavxav 4y ago

In France, you normally can't apply for a thesis without funding (it may vary on field though). And the moment you have funding that makes you an employee, with the protections accorded. Since most theses are funded using public money, you become a state employee with all the additional protections that implies. That said, PhD students (and researchers) are still poorly paid (though PhD stipends are being raised over the next few years), and though France has a legal 35 hour work week, informal pressure of academia means that tends to be thrown out the window. There are legal requirements on graduate schools that help protect students from abusive advisors or other abuse within their laboratories, of course since the research world is small, it remains to see how effective they can be.