Science PhDs are Just Fucked.
This is a topic that I love to rant about, and which has haunted me for more then ten years now. Today seems like the perfect day to write about, because no less than four articles on the subject have manifested themselves before me today.
- Reform the PhD System of Shut It Down
- Why Science is a Lousy Career Choice
- Education: The PhD Factory
- The PhD Problem: Are We Giving Out Too Many Degrees?
These articles are US-centric, but I believe that the issue exists in all of the West. The point is that with a PhD in science or engineering, you really don’t end up with many career opportunities (doing what you studied). Positions and funding are limited in academia, and most science jobs in industry fall under the heading of “working for the Man” (i.e. your soul is destroyed in Hades minute). Which is a damn shame, because I quite like science!
I was recently speaking to a friend of mine who has a PhD in wireless communications, and even works for a large company doing just that. His advice, depressingly, “Martin, never go into this industry. If your job isn’t outsourced, then your company’s products will be reverse engineered and used to undercut you in the market. You can’t keep up the innovation fast enough to survive.” That’s pretty bleak. And he’s trying to get out.
The best answer (for me) that I have to any of these issues at the moment is to force a solution on your own terms and head to the start-up world.
