Current USPTO patent examiner here. The job is regarded as difficult by the vast majority of examiners, as it's based on a quota system and examiners don't get

Current USPTO patent examiner here. The job is regarded as difficult by the vast majority of examiners, as it's based on a quota system and examiners don't get enough time to do a quality job. I don't know of a single examiner who works only one day a week. Many work unpaid overtime to meet their quotas, euphemistically called "voluntary overtime", which is rarely voluntary. There's about 50% attrition in the first year for new hires right now. That sound easy to you? I don't know any other job that hires white-collar professionals with such high attrition. I encourage anyone who believes being a patent examiner is an easy job to read this subreddit: https://www.reddit.com/r/patentexaminer/ https://www.reddit.com/r/patentexaminer/ You can find patent examiners who say that being a patent examiner is relatively easy. These folks typically changed from a notoriously difficult job in law or academia. So it's only relatively easier. Beyond these cases, there do seem to be some examiners who have an easy time, but that's quite rare in my experience, and I'd question the quality of their work. As for why I took the job: I came from academia, so the job is easier in some respects. The quota isn't entirely bad: It's hard to meet, yes, but it's also mostly objective. If an examiner's numbers are good, the USPTO is happy with them. That contrasts with my experience in academia, where one's job performance is often subjective. If a researcher's boss decides they don't like the researcher for whatever reason (office politics, the researcher is socially awkward, etc.), there might be nothing the researcher could do to recover from that. The job also does give me a lot of freedom in other ways: I can live mostly anywhere I want to, I'm not expected to work all the time (production numbers beat looking busy by working all the time), there are few IP restrictions (aside from that I can't get a US patent), etc. The main problems for me are that the quota is too high and that I don't care for the technology I'm assigned (though the technology could be a lot worse). (It should go without saying that this comment is my own opinion and not that of the USPTO, US govt., my previous employers, etc.)