Although I agree with nearly everything he says in this essay, it's worth pointing out that he has written several other pieces that would make most normal people question his grip on sanity. At the very least, this guy is eccentric. Also, the numbers he cited are from 1999, and are getting a bit dated. NIH post-doc stipends are now roughly $40k/year (including in the most expensive cities, like San Francisco); grad-student stipends are around $25k per year.
Everything else is true, in my experience. If you start a PhD in the physical or biological sciences this year, you'll spend 5-10 years in grad school, barely making ends meet at $25k a year. Then, if you're incredibly lucky (think 95th-percentile lucky), you'll get a stellar paper that will set you up for a post-doc in a superstar lab, which will give you a roughly 50/50 shot at a tenure track position somewhere (don't count on living in a city, or even a place where your significant other can find a job, however, because you're now living at the whims of the academic system.)
Your post-doc will take 3-4 years, and will pay you less than you could have made right out of an undergraduate CS program, in exchange for more risk and longer hours. You'll be expected to work nights and weekends, and in case you lack the drive to do it, there will be some guy from China with a J-1 visa sitting next to you. He's probably living in a boarding house right next to the university with ten other post-docs, and he's willing to work 100-hour weeks for a shot at a job in this country. That's your baseline.
If you're astronomically lucky, you'll get a faculty position -- hopefully not at Podunk U -- where you'll be paid significantly less than that undergrad CS major (who is now probably making over $100k/year, buying a home, getting married, etc.) You'll be competing for grant money in an insanely tight market (the funding rate for NIH research grants is well below 5% now), and evaluated by established faculty who will torpedo your proposals if it helps their own chances. At the end of six years of insane work, you'll get a shot at keeping your job. If you get tenure, you can settle down to a lifetime of below-market wages, while working relaxing 50-60 hour weeks.
Of course, if you choose to leave academia after grad school, the prospects are equally dismal. The rare position that requires research experience is essentially set aside for friends (you hear a lot about "networking" on the science job boards, but little practical advice on how to actually do it), or for people who have been poached from other companies by recruiters. Meanwhile, once you have a PhD, you're untouchable by most employers -- considered too theoretical and expensive for "practical" work. Ultimately, most people with advanced degrees in the sciences spend years teaching courses on contract, or jumping between dead-end, low-paying jobs, hoping to start something that resembles a career.
He'd have to be. Nobody gets anywhere in academia by rocking the boat. It's an intensely political business; even after you have tenure, you can still lose your research funding (which kills your "summer salary", lowering your take-home pay by 25% or more), your lab space, your future publications in prestigious journals (which can be anonymously torpedoed by your peers) and, most important of all, the services of the talented grad students and postdocs who actually do all your work for you.
Meanwhile, once you have a PhD, you're untouchable by most employers -- considered too theoretical and expensive for "practical" work.
This depends a great deal on what your Ph.D. is in and how you treat it. I've never had this problem, but I got my Ph.D. in EE, with a focus on semiconductor device fabrication. Nobody ever accused me of being "too theoretical" and there are actually quite a few industry employers that specifically look for such Ph.D.s.
A very smart friend of mine studied theoretical solid state physics, but then got a job right out of school as a process development guy at Intel. Voila, his "theoretical" reputation was instantly laundered away!
Of course, if you spend the five years after getting your Ph.D. "teaching courses on contract, or jumping between dead-end, low-paying jobs" people will begin to conclude that you're hopelessly in love with the academic lifestyle. And that's too bad. The academic lifestyle is fun in many ways -- for example, your ambitious and hard-working colleagues from China and India are often really nice, really smart people! -- but it's a terribly one-sided romance.
"This depends a great deal on what your Ph.D. is in and how you treat it. I've never had this problem, but I got my Ph.D. in EE, with a focus on semiconductor device fabrication."
Agree. I was trying to be careful to speak only of the physical and biological sciences, because I know from experience that job market for engineering and CS is different.
I don't think that anyone tries to spend their post-doctoral years hopping between contract jobs; the problem comes when you simply can't get that first job in your field, and you have to do these things to make ends meet. Before you know it, you're stuck in a cycle, and people start to believe that you're "in love with the academic lifestyle". This happens to scientists more often than most people think.
By the way, this isn't true for chemists. My roommate's a chem major and has interned all over the place; the scientists he works with apparently had little trouble finding jobs (here in NJ, anyway). Of course, their research centers on perfume or toothpaste...
Everything else is true, in my experience. If you start a PhD in the physical or biological sciences this year, you'll spend 5-10 years in grad school, barely making ends meet at $25k a year. Then, if you're incredibly lucky (think 95th-percentile lucky), you'll get a stellar paper that will set you up for a post-doc in a superstar lab, which will give you a roughly 50/50 shot at a tenure track position somewhere (don't count on living in a city, or even a place where your significant other can find a job, however, because you're now living at the whims of the academic system.)
Your post-doc will take 3-4 years, and will pay you less than you could have made right out of an undergraduate CS program, in exchange for more risk and longer hours. You'll be expected to work nights and weekends, and in case you lack the drive to do it, there will be some guy from China with a J-1 visa sitting next to you. He's probably living in a boarding house right next to the university with ten other post-docs, and he's willing to work 100-hour weeks for a shot at a job in this country. That's your baseline.
If you're astronomically lucky, you'll get a faculty position -- hopefully not at Podunk U -- where you'll be paid significantly less than that undergrad CS major (who is now probably making over $100k/year, buying a home, getting married, etc.) You'll be competing for grant money in an insanely tight market (the funding rate for NIH research grants is well below 5% now), and evaluated by established faculty who will torpedo your proposals if it helps their own chances. At the end of six years of insane work, you'll get a shot at keeping your job. If you get tenure, you can settle down to a lifetime of below-market wages, while working relaxing 50-60 hour weeks.
Of course, if you choose to leave academia after grad school, the prospects are equally dismal. The rare position that requires research experience is essentially set aside for friends (you hear a lot about "networking" on the science job boards, but little practical advice on how to actually do it), or for people who have been poached from other companies by recruiters. Meanwhile, once you have a PhD, you're untouchable by most employers -- considered too theoretical and expensive for "practical" work. Ultimately, most people with advanced degrees in the sciences spend years teaching courses on contract, or jumping between dead-end, low-paying jobs, hoping to start something that resembles a career.