I spent some time doing a (never completed) PhD in chemistry before I got into CS. One thing that stuck with me was a comment my PI made frequently -- he always

I spent some time doing a (never completed) PhD in chemistry before I got into CS. One thing that stuck with me was a comment my PI made frequently -- he always said that there were fewer tenured chemistry professors in the US than there were professional baseball players. I never followed up on it; it might not be true![0] But it does back up your "jackpot winners" comment, which I think is true even if his particular stat is wrong. It's really formed my perspective of academia, given that it came from someone with both tenure and decades in academia. [0]: a quick search didn't yield any hard numbers. Maybe someone with better research skills could find 'em.