Industry does not like to hire from academia (and vice versa) for various reasons.
Except in the areas of Artificial Intelligence and Quantum Computing it would seem.
As you well know, the fastest way for any Canadian graduate to bump in salary is to move south. We did, and many of our assorted STEM friends did as well.
That is somewhat true, yes. But that doesn’t change the fact that starting salaries for industry jobs for bio graduates are low. It just means that the starting salaries for industry jobs for PhDs are also low. That’s why so many bio PhDs do endless poorly-paid postdoc positions that don’t really advance their careers. And then their careers flounder while they try to figure out if they’re staying in temporary academic positions for low pay, or jumping ship for equally low pay.
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FWIW, a new middle/elementary school teacher with a PhD could start at $100,000 plus benes locally here.
The salary cap for ANY teacher in my very good Chicago-land school district JUST got raised to $84K. Teachers start at $47K.
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If you look at post-grad surveys for bio majors at colleges in your area, I think you’ll find very few meet the salary range you listed, making it non-typical. According to Payscale, the numbers you listed correspond to ~95th percentile salary for entry level high school teachers in CA. Across the full nation, the median is listed as $42k for entry level HS teachers, which is reasonably consistent with the previously listed typical earnings for bio majors without further degrees. One also needs to consider that a large portion of bio majors do not want to be primary school teachers. Skimming through the previously linked Berkeley bio major outcomes, the number of Berkeley bio majors working as primary school teachers was 0.
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From Indeed.ca
Postdoctoral fellow: Physics of Cell Biology
Ryerson University
Department of Physics, Faculty of Science
Qualifications
- PhD in Physics or a related field
- Ideal candidate will have experience in scientific programming, quantitative modeling of biological systems, and statistical mechanics
- Strong communication skills, an appetite for interdisciplinary r esearch, and a drive to push on challenging problems are also desirable
- Interest in theoretical physics and cell biology
- Ability to conduct independent r esearch, data analysis, and write peer reviewed journal articles
Rate of pay: $47,000 CAD per annum
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It’s a living. Plus, you can still do contract or PT industry work on the side.
My spouse had an Phd acquaintance (Stanford)who was looking for a job at my husbands firm. The issue seemed to be the guy had little experience relative to age and his expectations for salary were high relative to experience. Same thing happened multiple times. Phd’s were always outstanding in terms of intellect but had little training/experience and needed to recoup their educational costs as they had families to support.
Might be something to think about if you/your kid is considering a Phd. You might have an additional degree but others will have more work experience at that age and lower expenses.
For my own kids, I would only suggest Phd for academia (or something that had a barrier to entry without it). Otherwise, I’d advise them to get a Masters and work. Naturally, some careers are going to require a Phd, but people need to think about the years out of the workforce as well as the costs.
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The whole point of a PhD is to train you to be able to design and conduct r esearch and supervise and run your own lab. In addition to technical skills, you need to now how to secure funding and manage a departmental budget. It’s equivalent to running your own business. What skills and experience do they not have?
Yep. We go through this all the time on here. There such a big pay differential for teachers around the country. We top out at 30 years with a PhD at $69K and that doesn’t include the $2000/month health insurance premium for a family plan, or $1200/month for employee and spouse.
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In theory. In reality, in many labs, graduate students are serving as cheap labor for the PI to generate as many publications as possible while being pigeonholed into a specific research area.
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Is there any employer subsidy at all for those insurance plans? Those prices seem like full price ACA plan costs.
I was assuming the person in question already held a faculty position. In that case, that’s what a Post-Doc is for.
PhDs should have relatively little educational debt (PhD programs worth attending are fully funded). They have training and experience in specialized research (and probably teaching college students as TAs)… though that is often not in much demand (relative to the number of job seekers) outside of colleges in many subjects. Or even at colleges, where tenure-track jobs are scarce compared to the number seeking them, and many PhDs are lucky to get enough adjunct jobs.
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I think many PhD graduates have problems marketing themselves to industry since most programs are focused on producing candidates for academia. They often don’t emphasize the soft skills they’ve acquired throughout their studies that can be broadly applicable to a variety of employment fields.
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For single only, it’s not bad. $150/month, but they never had any subsidy for anything single. Even in the mid 90s it was $800/month for family plan. And, it was a horrible plan where the wellness child visits weren’t covered at all and wouldn’t go toward your deductible. $250/pop every time. And that’s when the teachers were making in the mid 20K range. Hence why I’ve always had to work. I don’t see how a single parent could do it.
Seems like it may be worth checking if ACA plans in your area are cheaper and better and, if so, whether you can opt out of the employer plan and use an ACA plan.
MOST??? I dunno, but we must run in different circles. When I contemplated college and grad school back in the day, I never chose my field based on the income it might generate. I went into education. I have a graduate degree in it from Harvard. Of course, the pay scale today is way higher than when I was 23, but my starting salary as a teacher was $11,000/year, LOL! I still think education is not a well paying field and I am still in education. When my kids chose fields to pursue, it was NOT with potential income in mind. They followed their interests. Both are doing fine in my view, self supporting since their graduation day and in Manhattan and own small apartments, which cost way more than the rural home they grew up in.
I work with students applying to college. Sure, some of them, particularly from certain cultural backgrounds, I can tell their choice of major is being influenced heavily by the parents and toward thinking of income potential. But many of my students are purely seeking out their interests and their parents support them fully in doing so. So, yes, I believe some choose field of study or careers based on incomes earned and some based on genuine interest and passion in a particular field, and I don’t think “most” fall into just one of these categories, nor do I believe that it breaks down into those who follow their interests are the ones seeking arts, education, or other similar “passions” you refer to. I know some who are pursuing many fields out of pure interest in the subject/field.
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