5 ms·

>this article speaks quite positively about the benefits of doing a PhD. That's not at all what I got out of it. I read that phds provide no material advantage

by rm999 14y ago

>this article speaks quite positively about the benefits of doing a PhD. That's not at all what I got out of it. I read that phds provide no material advantage and that they're really tough (in every way, including from a psychological standpoint). >you're not confined to becoming a professor at a state school. This is a legitimate fear, and one of the things that has always made me frightened of pursuing a PhD. Confined? Most people don't have this choice. Fear? This a dream of a large % of phd graduates. I'd add one thing that the article doesn't mention: graduate school is far less of a meritocracy than people outside realize. There are so many levels of luck involved, including finding a good advisor, department politics, finding a good project, not having your research 'scooped', funding, etc. These things are correlated with intelligence/ability, but a large number of smart people fail grad school for reasons beyond their control, and a significant % of the people who succeed were blessed with amazing luck. It's the smart and accomplished undergrads (which I take it you are) who have the most to lose. >I'll likely bear little to no fiscal loss. Consider the opportunity cost. Here are some reasonable numbers: a masters costs 25K, a phd pays out 150K over six years, and in the five years of working the masters makes 500K. By the time the phd is out of school the masters student is 325K ahead of the phd student, and his work experience/career is probably further (meaning his salary will probably be at least as high). Also, the masters student lived more comfortably in those five years. > The work will most probably be more interesting than the work I'd be doing had I not done a PhD. I have seen very few industry jobs that require a phd, and I work in a field dominated by phds. The exception is industry research, which is great but isn't open to most phds. Most phds don't be doing anything resembling their research two years out of grad school. I don't mean to make a phd sound totally crappy. There's a lot you can get out of it, it teaches you how to think and organize projects in a way that's hard to find outside grad school. You'll meet smart, motivated people. You'll be able to interact with professors as almost-peers. But consider a research-oriented masters, it's what I did and I consider it a happy medium.

kd0amg 14y ago
Confined? Most people don't have this choice. Fear? This a dream of a large % of phd graduates. I don't think GP meant it as "stuck as an assistant professor at UT Austin" -- more like "choosing between becoming an adjunct professor at University of Nowhere-You've-Ever-Heard-Of and not having a job."
dbecker 14y ago
> a phd pays out 150K over six years I'm not a CS PhD, but I'd be astounded if they pay tuition. I knew PhD students in a variety of fields when I was doing mine, and everyone received money from the University rather than paying tuition. You're point about opportunity cost stands though.
- rm999 14y ago
  Sorry, I meant that's how much the student gets paid (and is how I did my math).
javert 14y ago
To give a counterpoint, as a current CS PhD student... If you measure how much money someone will make in the next 10 years from the point they decide whether to pursue a PhD or not, yes, you are correct, the ones who do not pursue one will have lots more money. However, you can live a middle class lifestyle while gettings a PhD (OK, maybe "lower middle class" here, but still very comfortably, if you don't have dependents to support) and also after getting a PhD, which is the same result as if you didn't pursue the PhD. To me, that is more relevant than a raw amount of money. I care what class I'm in, i.e., (a) starving; (b) poor; (c) middle class; (d) rich. I don't really care _within_ those categories. As a sidenote, I think getting a PhD increases your likelihood of getting an otherwise unlikely outcome in the sense of career success/advancement, getting rich, etc. (unless you choose academia). I mean, over the course of your career, you could really leverage your PhD, or you could not. In theory (and probably in practice most of the time), it won't hurt to have one, career-wise.
- eshvk 14y ago
  > As a sidenote, I think getting a PhD increases your likelihood of getting an otherwise unlikely outcome in the sense of career success/advancement, getting rich, etc. (unless you choose academia). I mean, over the course of your career, you could really leverage your PhD, or you could not. In theory (and probably in practice most of the time), it won't hurt to have one, career-wise. To give you another counterpoint, as a person who dropped out of a C.S. PhD and went to industry. Sure, it won't hurt to get a PhD. Getting rich unfortunately is only weakly correlated with technical ability beyond a certain point. 1) You are not going to get rich purely as a salary (wo)man unless you are lucky enough to be an early stage employee (which I don't see how the PhD or otherwise helps you that much. ). 2) To found your own company and leverage your PhD skills seems tempting but rarely if ever do PhD's have research that can be converted into successful industry products. Boston Dynamics is one of those rare examples. However, these opportunities are not closed to off to people who while they may not have done research in the field and know every other implication of certain strategies but have great contacts and know how to get things done.
  - _dark_matter_ 14y ago
bearmf 14y ago
Opportunity cost is tricky. For a hypothetical masters graduate who is already working you have to factor increased spending (which definitely increases with income), probably much higher rent and other "advantages" of adult life. He might not even live more comfortably than a PhD student if he is in a place like NYC/SF and probably will not save much money.
- hedgie 14y ago
  so the counterargument is that the opportunity cost doesn't exist because the hypothetical MS grad earning more is bad at managing money?
  - bearmf 14y ago
    It does exist but it is smaller than 350k in the post. He might be not bad at managing money but almost everyone who starts earning more starts spending more. This is not bad money management, this is human nature. Another effect is cost-of-living changes when moving from college town to real life. If a graduate earns 100k, it is probably not in a low-cost area. Taxes on this income are also higher than on a PhD income.

by rm999 14y ago

kd0amg 14y ago

Confined? Most people don't have this choice. Fear? This a dream of a large % of phd graduates. I don't think GP meant it as "stuck as an assistant professor at UT Austin" -- more like "choosing between becoming an adjunct professor at University of Nowhere-You've-Ever-Heard-Of and not having a job."

dbecker 14y ago

> a phd pays out 150K over six years I'm not a CS PhD, but I'd be astounded if they pay tuition. I knew PhD students in a variety of fields when I was doing mine, and everyone received money from the University rather than paying tuition. You're point about opportunity cost stands though.

rm999 14y ago
Sorry, I meant that's how much the student gets paid (and is how I did my math).

javert 14y ago

To give a counterpoint, as a current CS PhD student... If you measure how much money someone will make in the next 10 years from the point they decide whether to pursue a PhD or not, yes, you are correct, the ones who do not pursue one will have lots more money. However, you can live a middle class lifestyle while gettings a PhD (OK, maybe "lower middle class" here, but still very comfortably, if you don't have dependents to support) and also after getting a PhD, which is the same result as if you didn't pursue the PhD. To me, that is more relevant than a raw amount of money. I care what class I'm in, i.e., (a) starving; (b) poor; (c) middle class; (d) rich. I don't really care _within_ those categories. As a sidenote, I think getting a PhD increases your likelihood of getting an otherwise unlikely outcome in the sense of career success/advancement, getting rich, etc. (unless you choose academia). I mean, over the course of your career, you could really leverage your PhD, or you could not. In theory (and probably in practice most of the time), it won't hurt to have one, career-wise.

eshvk 14y ago
> As a sidenote, I think getting a PhD increases your likelihood of getting an otherwise unlikely outcome in the sense of career success/advancement, getting rich, etc. (unless you choose academia). I mean, over the course of your career, you could really leverage your PhD, or you could not. In theory (and probably in practice most of the time), it won't hurt to have one, career-wise. To give you another counterpoint, as a person who dropped out of a C.S. PhD and went to industry. Sure, it won't hurt to get a PhD. Getting rich unfortunately is only weakly correlated with technical ability beyond a certain point. 1) You are not going to get rich purely as a salary (wo)man unless you are lucky enough to be an early stage employee (which I don't see how the PhD or otherwise helps you that much. ). 2) To found your own company and leverage your PhD skills seems tempting but rarely if ever do PhD's have research that can be converted into successful industry products. Boston Dynamics is one of those rare examples. However, these opportunities are not closed to off to people who while they may not have done research in the field and know every other implication of certain strategies but have great contacts and know how to get things done.
- _dark_matter_ 14y ago

bearmf 14y ago

Opportunity cost is tricky. For a hypothetical masters graduate who is already working you have to factor increased spending (which definitely increases with income), probably much higher rent and other "advantages" of adult life. He might not even live more comfortably than a PhD student if he is in a place like NYC/SF and probably will not save much money.

hedgie 14y ago
so the counterargument is that the opportunity cost doesn't exist because the hypothetical MS grad earning more is bad at managing money?
- bearmf 14y ago
  It does exist but it is smaller than 350k in the post. He might be not bad at managing money but almost everyone who starts earning more starts spending more. This is not bad money management, this is human nature. Another effect is cost-of-living changes when moving from college town to real life. If a graduate earns 100k, it is probably not in a low-cost area. Taxes on this income are also higher than on a PhD income.