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Yet another worrying sign is that at my university (and I've heard similar stories from colleagues at others) is now deciding that instead of hiring 2 or 3 juni
by plg 13y ago
Yet another worrying sign is that at my university (and I've heard similar stories from colleagues at others) is now deciding that instead of hiring 2 or 3 junior faculty positions (new academics straight out of a postdoc into their first faculty job), instead the priority is to spend the same money on one mid-career "poach" from a competing institution. Double the salary, and bigger startup package. Their rationale is that mid-career scientists will bring larger and more research grants (and will do so faster after arriving) than junior scientists. Essentially, let someone else take on the "risk" of the new faculty members and we poach the proven ones.
It's a jungle out there people. If you care about salary and upward mobility for god's sake don't go into academia.
PS I am a full professor at a large research oriented university in north america. Most of my contemporaries from high school and undergrad who have spent similar numbers of years amassing expertise in their chosen fields, but in the private sector, are now making approximately 5x to 7x my annual salary (not including their annual bonuses).
- Create 13y agoAdd a Scandinavian example to the collection.
- mynewwork 13y agoMost are making 5x to 7x? If we estimate that a professor in a low-paid field makes maybe $60k (ignoring the possibility of grants to pay for additional salary during the summer) this would mean most of your high school friends are now making $300k to $420k. It's rare that most of a high school or college's students go on to become 1 percenters.
- santaclaus 13y agoOP might have graduated from Phillips Exeter Academy.
- amark 13y agoHe said contemporaries, not friends. Meaning that other successful PHDs/Scientists that put in the same amount of work that he did, but in the private sector, are making that much money.
- santaclaus 13y agoThat seems like an unusually low salary, then. Let's pick a major public research university in the US and a department, say Physics UT Austin (feel free to play the same game with data from another public and another department, like CS at UC Berkeley). Browsing through professor salaries [1], by the time Professors hit tenure they are approaching or breaking 100K a year. Five to seven times this is 500-700K a year! [1] http://www.texastribune.org/library/data/government-employee-salaries/the-university-of-texas-at-austin/departments/department-of-physics/17766/ http://www.texastribune.org/library/data/government-employee...
- amark 13y agoNobody gets tenure anymore. Most stay as associate professors, and make 60-70k.
- santaclaus 13y agoIt's usually a big deal when a professor fails to make tenure at a respectable university. I can think of multiple case studies at MIT and Stanford. Departments look bad when they are forced to drop promising talent.
- Fomite 13y agoIt's becoming far more common. More importantly, there are far more positions being created that aren't on tenure track in the first place.
- pseut 13y agoPay raises after tenure are nowhere near what you see in the private sector. And people who get tenure at Cal or UT are exceptional. Do you think the smartest 30-40yos in Austin outside UT are only making 500k?
- santaclaus 13y agoSo let's pick a mid-range public research university with mandatory salary reporting. I'm going to go with bio medical engineering at UNC Chapel Hill [1]. These cats are breaking 100k at associate professor. This is also just salary. Most profs I know take in another 30-40k a year between consulting, testifying as experts in court, etc. While 130 +/- 30k a year isn't going to catapult you into the upper echelons of the American elite, a guaranteed gig for life at six figures with benefits is hardly a bad way to live. Could these guys make more money in private sector? Sure. But they certainly aren't hurting either. [1] http://www.newsobserver.com/2011/02/24/1011452/university-employee-salaries.html?appSession=353440307001767&RecordID=&PageID=2&PrevPageID=2&cpipage=1&CPIsortType=asc&CPIorderby=totalsal http://www.newsobserver.com/2011/02/24/1011452/university-em...