Although I have a PhD. in mathematics, I found the field needlessly, gratuitously competitive--nasty even--and I left. Math education--another related subject

Although I have a PhD. in mathematics, I found the field needlessly, gratuitously competitive--nasty even--and I left. Math education--another related subject which mathematicians often feel competent to pronounce upon--seems to be a mine field [1]. There are only a few thousand mathematicians who are paid to do mathematics--for the rest of us, the opportunity cost is almost infinite. This is, for me, the real disincentive: the light at the end of the tunnel is hardly more than a few photons. [1] A double entendre. A mine field is a set with the standard field operations, which belongs only to the educator.