Chemistry PhD worth?

College Majors Science Majors
1 
      I want to go to UCSD and pursue a PhD in chemistry, organic to be more specific. I want to go into pharmacy research for drugs, that is until I read all the horrific stories about chemistry PhDs. For the best answers I want to say a few things, in my 3rd or 4th year at UCSD I want to TA for lower chemistry classes, or organic chemistry, this means for the years I am TAing, I will not need to pay for college and will be paid 25k (according to my friends at UCSD). So I will not be spending 175k for 8 years, in addition to this I have enough AP/Community College credits to lessen it to be about 7 years or possibly less. With this, should I aim for a PhD or will the pay off be too minimal? Or should I go for chemistry master and/or bachelors? After A LOT of research it is clear to me there are many paths for a lower end chemist as well, however these pay from 50k to 80k (beginning salary for flavor chemists to geochemists respectively)  for the jobs I am interested in versus the 90k or so for chemical engineers/researchers. I am interested in toxicologist, flavor chemists, forensic chemistry, and possibly geochemistry. I am open to other jobs in chemistry, these are just the ones I know of .I really love chemistry, but I still want to be comfortable money wise and don't want to be in debt all my life because of my degree.

Thanks

2

Chemistry PhDs earn a median $100,000. If that isn’t enough for you, better head to Wall Street. with the rest of the barbarians.
Sheesh. We used to do things because we liked them or were good at them. Now, it’s all about money.

3

I know the pay, I meant if I can get a job or not/if it is one I like. Didn’t mean to be rude sorry.

4

The unemployment rate for people with bachelor’s degrees is about 3%. For Masters, it’s even lower and lower yet for PhDs.

I don’t know if you can get a job. Getting a job is up to you.

5

OK, you are assuming, incorrectly, that you should and will stay at UCSD for your B.S. and then a Ph.D. This is not only unlikely but it is generally considered to be a bad idea. Start by getting your B.S. and as much research experience as you can. Then apply to graduate programs in your final year of college and ask your research mentors what programs might be the right ones for you.

6

??? In another thread you are desperate to do electrical engineering. If you are not even in college yet, it is too
soon to figure out if you want to or should do a PhD. You are asking about a PhD program as if you are about to apply to one. You will get some better idea once you are a college student.

7

Are you in college yet?

If you do not have your bachelor’s degree yet, then I think you are getting WAY ahead of yourself. Focus on getting your bachelor’s first. Get research experience to see if you really want to get your PhD and to strengthen a future graduate application. Ask professors for their advice on whether you should get your master’s or PhD. Research programs with faculty that are doing research that interests you and see what requirements they have. Look at the job outlook for industry and academic positions in chemistry. Also, many chemistry PhD programs provide funding to their students, and it’s generally advised that if your not given funding then you shouldn’t get your PhD. Also, PhD programs can often be more than 4 years (about 5 is usually the estimate I give). And you often get your PhD from a different institution than where you get your bachelor’s (not always, but this is generally common practice).

Basically, take it one step at a time. If you’re in high school, focus on getting your bachelor’s. If you’re in college, focus on getting research experience. If you have research experience, focus on researching different PhD programs, what the job outlook is for people with PhDs, what getting a PhD actually entails, and what you need for your application.

8

Chemistry and most other PhD’s are being produced at a rate far exceeding the job market’s demand for them as a result job prospects are terrible. Academia relies on the labor of grad students and post docs so they will not address the issue.

My take is that it is a pyramid scheme for Universities and an outright scam for companies trying to flood the market with desperate science talent willing to take the abuse and insulting salaries they offer.

I was strongly encouraged to get my PhD and initially when I started grad school I intended to. I made that decision on the basis of 2 main points.

  1. The program is 4-5 years
  2. It would enhance my salary and job prospects.

Once it became clear that both were lies I opted for the MS.

The average for completing a PhD is now 7 years and everyone from my lab who did are stuck in post-docs 5 years later with no prospects of ever having a real job. They will end up doing a career change around age 40 having to deal with the PhD = overqualified for everything stigma attached to them for the rest of their life.

Science in this country has degenerated into a sick joke and a trap that exploits and abuses the brightest but naive. The grad student program has become a pyramid scheme and as a source for cheap scientific labor for Universities to do research and teach undergrad science. Watson famous for co-discovering the double helix structure of DNA lambasted the scientific community for turning grad school into a serfdom. Many PI’s don’t give any sort of mentor-ship and completion rates can be as low as 1/3 though 1/2 is average. The PI at the lab where I worked not only did not mentor anyone he kept his most productive students from graduating. One of my colleagues had to get the provost involved. There is no accountability in PhD programs for providing a quality educational experience rather than simple exploitation.

Any student that manages to get through the above gauntlet has little to look forward to but endless crappy post-docs and falling further behind in life.

Things are not much better on the industry side of things as the huge excess of scientific talent, the h1b program, and offshoring allow companies to abuse their science staff like no other group of workers. Most positions pay at least 30 to 50 percent below what they should, are extremely unstable, many are permatemp and have no benefits.

In short, pursuing a career in science is an act of madness. Our society does not value science at all anymore. That is why in many grad programs US citizens are a minority. For third worlders, science represents a way out of poverty, but for Americans it has become the way into it.

http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/science-majors/1386469-is-the-science-ph-d-worth-it.html
http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/science-majors/1324120-science-phds-non-academic-career-paths-p1.html
http://www.theguardian.com/science/occams-corner/2012/nov/23/running-science-ponzi-scheme
http://pipeline.corante.com/archives/2013/01/24/too_many_scientists_a_pyramid_scheme.php

9

Maybe they should write some grants.

10

Yes and that grant pot is getting smaller and smaller. PI’s are nearly at the point where they are ready to knife each other over grants.

11

This article/blog sums it up very well. I’d post the whole article but it is to long.

http://liv.dreamwidth.org/389934.html

12

Sadly, it seems like students with a bent for sciences could only choose the engineering path in order not to make their degrees financially useless.