<p>Sakky,
The problem with your analysis is that what is marketable within academia as a historian has no relation to what’s marketable outside academia. All of the quantitative and statistical techniques you are talking about are actually not very commonly found in history, and are very unlikely to get you a job as an academic historian. If you choose to spend your time developing those techniques, you are doing that instead of something that could improve your chances of getting a job as an academic historian, which is, after all, the actual goal of most people in PhD programs. I don’t know where you’ve gotten the idea that history is being revolutionized by quantitative techniques, but it just isn’t true - very few things I read as a grad student in history use any statistical tools at all, and the ones that do never go much beyond a simple regression (and often interpret the data poorly). Perhaps by following your advice, a history grad student would be far more likely to get a non-academic job, but he or she would be simultaneously becoming far less likely to get an academic position in a history department. Sometimes there are overlaps: for instance, Chinese history is a growing field with a relatively good (though still very tough) job market, and knowing Chinese is presumably a marketable skill (at least, as a Chinese history grad student I like to pretend both those things are true). But for most things other than languages, that isn’t the case (and as has already been pointed out, if you don’t already know a language relatively well prior to applying to a graduate program, you aren’t going to find it very easy to switch to a topic that requires primary use of that language).</p>
<p>The impression I’ve gotten is that you basically don’t understand history as an academic field. The trends you are talking about mostly don’t apply to it, and it’s worth considering how that changes your analysis. The social sciences aren’t a monolith (and, perhaps more to the point, history is somewhat intermediate between the social sciences and the humanities) and you can’t simply pretend that they are. Maybe if we all studied economic history using mostly quantitative approaches, we’d be better off on the non-history job market, but if you’re going to do that, you should be applying to do an economics PhD, not a history PhD.</p>
<p>I agree with you that advisers should tell you if your topic is particularly unlikely to get you an academic job in history, but that really doesn’t solve the problem, as any topic one could choose has a very good chance of not getting you an academic job in history. In the end, the only real solution is to eliminate a large number of spots in PhD programs, both by downsizing and by departments that are ranked poorly getting rid of their PhD programs entirely, to better align the total production of PhDs with the number of jobs available.</p>
<p>Finally, as a PhD student at Harvard, I’d like very much to believe that you’re right about the name of my institution getting me a good job outside of academia if I fail to get one inside. But, I’m not really entirely convinced (and in any case, if that’s what I wanted, going to grad school in history wasn’t the right decision).</p>
<p>Sakky, you have way too much time on your hands to be writing these long posts and coming up with these terms that are not quite in the vernacular of historians. I’m just not going to respond because I just don’t have the luxury of time to argue with someone who just doesn’t get the “humanities” side of history.</p>
<p>I’m done with this thread unless the OP actually has more genuine questions which I will be happy to answer honestly as I have always done.</p>
<p>Which is why I stated from the very beginning that you need to honestly assess your job market chances sometime after your quals, and certainly by year 4, which is not far off from the time you would be on the market. By that time, you should have a good sense of how competitive your particular field is, and if it looks like your chances are poor, that is the time when you should be thinking of adding marketable skills. But you do need to be brutally honest with yourself about your prospects. </p>
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<p>Look, I never said (or at least, never meant to say) that history specifically is being revolutionized by quant techniques. What I said is that social science in general is being revolutionized by quant techniques, and since we had already established that pure history is a difficult job market, it therefore behooves prospective scholars to broaden their capabilities to make them marketable to other fields. Like I said, not all history faculty positions are in pure history departments. Plenty - including some of the highest paid ones - are in professional schools such as business schools or policy schools. </p>
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<p>My assumption is that the OP lacks the skillset, and particularly the talent in pure mathematics, to be admitted to an economics program, or to survive it should he be admitted. But I agree with you that if he does have that talent, an economics PhD program would probably be even better. </p>
<p>But look, I’m simply trying to help the OP by identifying one sub-field in history (economic/financial history) that seems to have far better academic job prospects than most other history subfields. I’m also trying to identify marketable skills that the OP could develop within the PhD program should he find that he cannot land an academic position. </p>
<p>Why is there something wrong with that? I don’t see what the problem is with that, and I am therefore mystified as to the pushback I have received. It seems to me that it precisely the fact that people aren’t told about promising research opportunities and skills which leads to the problem of students obtaining PhD’s yet being unable to find decent jobs. </p>
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<p>The definition of irony: somebody who responds to my posts by saying that they aren’t going to respond to my posts. Or, somebody who responds on a thread by saying that he’s done with the thread.</p>
<p>Look, ticklemepink, I said it before and I’ll say it again, if you don’t like my posts, fine, don’t read them. Nobody has a gun to your head.</p>
<p>"DH quit grad school after he passed his generals exams, with what they call an “all but dissertation”, or an M.A., on the diploma. He’s now making a very good living in business doing something completely unrelated to his major. He still loves history, but he wanted to support a family. Times were tough then, but I think they are even tougher now.
Honestly, the only people that should be going into academia right now, in my humble opinion, are those who truly can’t imagine doing anything else. There are so few jobs, especially in the humanities. "</p>
<p>What is his business and how do you get into it?</p>
<p>While reading the very forcefully argued opinions of the anonymous uninformed is at least half the fun of any online discussion forum, sometimes it’s also a good idea to learn from real people with relevant experience with the topic of concern. To that end, the OP and others interested in this thread may want to read the recent blog post by Dr. Erik Loomis, Asst. Prof., University of Rhode Island, Dept. of History, on this very topic.</p>
<p>The comments thread following the blog post is at least as interesting as the post itself.</p>
<p>I’m hoping to get a PhD in History of Science from one of a few top programs (I do have my heart set on one in particular). If I don’t get into any of them, I’ll seek a job as a programmer. I think that in a case like mine–in which one has a solid back-up plan, and will only consider a program that offers a healthy stipend–it’s fine to pursue a PhD in the humanities, even if it’s from a major public institution and not, say, an Ivy.</p>
<p>“Why is Grad school too much work? What does the too much work consist in?”</p>
<p>Lots of reading that you will actually need to have read/be familiar with for class. Add 9-12 hours of physical class time plus 10-20 hours of TA responsibilities as well.</p>
<p>"Lots of reading that you will actually need to have read/be familiar with for class. Add 9-12 hours of physical class time plus 10-20 hours of TA responsibilities as well. "</p>
<p>I see. So what should you do if you want to study something and earn money from it, without going to grad school?</p>
<p>The thing many on this thread simply are not trying to do is find the
medium between their ideas. It is <em>perfectly</em> possible for someone to
realize at a certain point that his/her skills are not going to win an
academic job, in all likelihood, and do something else for 2 to 3 years.
Why are we sticking to the idea of a 5 year program? I see students taking 6 years many times in other disciplines at least. If it is a question of being thrown into a harsh job market, an extra year to get
stuff together can help.</p>
<p>I agree that at the beginning, nobody but someone never intending to enter academia is advised to choose an academically non marketable topic. I have definitely heard of people successfully switching topics midway though, and even in cases where they DO want to enter academia. </p>
<p>I think though that rather than switching topics, an easier option would simply be to use one’s access to a university’s resources and learn some marketable skills. Plenty of people leave academia, and it does not seem that having research in statistics or whatever is necessary to get an industry job. </p>
<p>The hard thing though is that I suspect not everyone will be able to gauge chances of success so easily…only those who are definitely making it and definitely not making it will. Those who are in between are perhaps in one of the worst positions.</p>
<p>I think sakky’s suggestion has merit even if one does not change the dissertation topic, because learning where certain areas cross is quite an effective way to slowly transition to developing other skills. It is quite hard, in my experience, to suddenly spend a lot of time doing something in a totally different field, unless one is by chance already acquainted with both.</p>
<p>The problem with Sakkys approach to this problem is that you either have enough time to learn marketable skills, or have enough time to put together a solid dissertation. You will not have enough time to do both. Moreover, Sakky completely misses the main problem here: if you do wind up trying to get a job outside of academia, you will be competing against people who have advanced degrees in Statistics, Mathematics, Physics, and Computer Science, and have tons more experience in those skills… The likely outcome is that you will wind up competing with undergraduates for entry-level positions, that you probably could have qualified for before embarking on your PhD. So you will have spent four to six years to wind up back where you would have been had you never gone… It’s not a good deal any way you look at it.</p>
<p>The only reason to go for a PhD is if you absolutely love the subject, and you are completely OK with the idea of never earning a tangible benefit from the PhD, besides the three letters besides your name. Don’t plan on a career in academia: there are so many factors out of your control there, that it’s more luck than skill to get a faculty position these days.</p>
<p>Last I checked, an advanced degree in math or physics doesn’t really help you much outside of academia, unless what you do in math and/or physics is marketable (trained you in modeling, or something like that). </p>
<p>I’m not sure that the point you claim being missed is being fully missed (but I do sympathize with your point), because it isn’t that simple - some students are probably very much in the know (or could be) that they aren’t going to make it in academia, and they probably could spend time building marketable skills with full knowledge that it’s a good idea. Then, there are the people who are pretty correctly confident that they will make it. It’s the ones in between who are in trouble, although to be honest, they are probably bright enough to at least get some decent postdoc position, and they can think about what to do based on the lack of success they’ve had the next few years.</p>
<p>Yes you may end up working with people who are just a few years out of college, but it’s better doing that than have even fewer options, for lack of any marketable skills at all. </p>
<p>I think rather than fixate on the PhD itself, let us remember that postdoc positions are just roughly glorified PhD students - they are there for a temporary span of time and are paid rather little, to research and teach. And realistically, the advice of “sniff out how your chances are looking” is pretty good. The guys in the middle will spend more time sniffing before either giving up or landing tenure-track positions. </p>
<p>I don’t think you can spend all your time developing marketable skills while still aiming for a good academic position, but the point is remembering that your life goes on for a while.</p>
<p>Let me give examples: person A applied to 10 grad schools and got into 1, ranked 100; person B applied to 7 and got into 1: a program in the top 25; person C applied to 5 and got into all 5, and is at the top program in the field, with professors really excited about the research he plans to do. These are the “low end,” “middle end” and super-successful researchers who probably will have different backup plans I wrote of.</p>
<p>I would say that for all of these people, both PhDs and postdoc positions are still fairly good opportunities in a lot of fields, particularly where they offer flexible lifestyles. You may not get much pay, but honestly, a lot of options are much worse for an undergraduate who exits with few connections or marketable skills.</p>
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<p>Of course nobody’s really going to be completely OK with it, or they wouldn’t be interested in researching for the rest of their lives in the first place. But sure, being OK with never getting an academia position in the sense of not wishing one spent the time some other way is important.</p>
<p>Who says that you necessarily have to put together a ‘solid’ dissertation? You can just put together one that merely meets the minimum standards. Believe me, I’ve seen the minimum standards necessary to complete a PhD for those who are not pursuing the academic job market, and they’re not that exacting. </p>
<p>Now, I agree that the tradeoff exists between learning marketable skills vs. putting together a strong dissertation. But, like I said, after a few years into a PhD program, you should have the information to make a determination regarding whether you have a realistic shot at a successful academic career. If the answer is honestly ‘no’, then you should shift your focus towards obtaining marketable skills while still doing the bare minimum necessary to complete the PhD. In fact, you can often times combine both: you can state that you want to develop marketable skills as part of your dissertation, once you (and your committee) have made peace with the fact that you’re not pursuing a traditional academic career anyway. </p>
<p>Ridiculous, you say? Then consider Gautam Mukunda, a PhD student in poli-sci at MIT (don’t laugh - MIT is the #10 ranked poli-sci program in the country) who quickly realized that he was not going to become successful on the poli-sci academic market. So he instead devoted some time towards learning various statistical software packages, with the justification that he wanted to build a statistical model of the leadership impact of the US Presidents in his dissertation, but also as a back-up plan towards becoming an statistical programmer/consultant. And indeed, he didn’t even get a single fly-out, let alone an offer, from any poli-sci department. {The story does have a happy ending, however, as he did have a lone academic flyout which turned into a formal tenure-track academic offer, from Harvard Business School.}</p>
<p>No, I never missed that point. In fact, that’s why I’ve always said that if you could choose to enter a PhD program in a quant subject, you should just do that rather than a PhD program in history (or other humanities). Nobody is disputing that a quant PhD is safer than a humanities PhD. </p>
<p>But let’s face it, the vast majority of people in humanities PhD programs have no chance of ever being admitted to a quant PhD program, let alone completing it. That’s like telling people that if they want to be more successful landing dates with women, they should be handsome like Johnny Depp. Obviously everybody would like to be handsome like Johnny Depp. But most are not, so the real question is, what should they do? </p>
<p>The real question is not whether you will be competitive for jobs relative to the quant PhD’s, but whether you will be more competitive than you had been before. </p>
<p>Frankly, the root problem is that too many people are choosing unmarketable undergrad majors such as history, and more of them should choose a more useful major (or perhaps not even go to college at all). If we had a time machine, perhaps he could have chosen a different major. But we don’t have one. So given that somebody did complete such a major, the only relevant question is, what should he do now? A PhD program is not the worst choice for such a person. After all, it’s better than stocking shelves at the mall or delivering pizzas (which is what many humanities grads that I know are doing).</p>
<p>So, sure, somebody with a Phd in humanities will be at a disadvantage against somebody with a quant Phd for industry jobs, but that’s no different than how an ugly man will always be at a disadvantage against handsome men when looking for dates. There’s nothing we can do about that. But just like how an ugly man can still improve his attractiveness through exercise and grooming, a humanities PhD can improve his marketability by developing appropriate skills. </p>
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<p>Not if you developed directly marketable skills while in your PhD program. I certainly agree that if you don’t develop such skills, then you may indeed be relegated to competing against undergrads. Develop skills that are immediately useful and marketable right from the start. One of the overweening problems of all undergrad majors - with the possible exception of CS - is their incessant refusal to teach directly marketable skills. Even most engineering majors refuse to teach skills that are immediately useful. </p>
<p>Let me offer a specific example: Train yourself on SAS. Most respectable universities provide access to SAS, either within a dedicated computer lab or for a nominal fee for a home license. Learn it well enough to earn basic SAS-certification (which should only take a few months of dedicated study). You can justify it by saying that you want to build a statistical model to characterize some historical phenomenon. Once you’re SAS certified, you can always fall back to a respectable career as a SAS programmer. </p>
<p>Nor is SAS the only option. You could do the same with Stata, SPSS, or (arguably the best of all) R. But the upshot is the same - take advantage of your university’s resources to develop marketable skills. </p>
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<p>Look, I think the real problem is that too many people did not develop marketable skills while as undergrads (or heck, even as high school students). If anything should have been changed, it would have been that. Those students should have been building marketable skills since their teenage years. </p>
<p>But that’s neither here nor there, for I am taking the fact that they graduated with an unmarketable bachelor’s degree such as history as a given. The only relevant question is: what should they do now? That is why, if they are considering a Phd program, I have endorsed the following strategy which I repeat here:</p>
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<li>If you can be admitted, choose a PhD program housed in a well-branded university with an elite alumni network and recruiting access, with Harvard being the first choice by far. That way, if nothing else, you can at least leverage the overall brand-name and network of your university to find a job to your liking. {If Harvard history undergrads can obtain elite investment banking and consulting jobs, surely you can do likewise as a Harvard PhD student.}<br></li>
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<p>In fact, I would go so far as to prioritize the overall brand/network of the university above the specific ranking of the department. For example, I would probably choose Duke over UNC despite the fact that UNC is actually rated higher than Duke in history. Let’s face it, Duke has a better overall brand and network, and elite employers such as consulting and banking firms care little about the specific ranking of your degree program, but rather place far more weight upon the brand. </p>
<p>*Choose a university located in a major business region. That way, if academia works, you can use your time in the PhD program as an extended (and paid) job search. New York, the SF Bay Area, Chicago, Boston, Washington DC, Los Angeles are excellent choices. You should probably avoid being stuck in the boonies, such as, say, Ithaca NY. </p>
<p>Now, granted, a tension exists between the first and second points above. Cornell is a well-branded university with a strong network, but unfortunately has the serious detraction of being located in a region where outside networking and recruiting is essentially impossible. For that reason, I would probably prefer to attend Northwestern or NYU over Cornell, for while you forfeit some brand and history ranking points, you gain access to a major business center. </p>
<p>*Honestly assess your chances for academia around year 3-4. That is precisely the time when you should know whether you have a realistic shot at such a career or not, and if you don’t know, then you should ask the faculty for a (brutally) honest appraisal of the receptivity of the job market to your type of research. If the odds look inauspicious, then that’s what you should reorient yourself towards developing marketable skills - all while perhaps finishing the PhD, or perhaps just taking the consolation master’s. </p>
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<p>Like I said, if anything could be said to be “not a good deal”, it was simply choosing to major in history as an undergrad while never developing marketable skills. But hey, what’s done is done. The only question that matters is what to do going forward. </p>
<p>I maintain the position that a PhD program is really not a terrible choice out of the constrained choice set that such people have. It surely beats stocking shelves at the mall, which is precisely what many humanities graduates that I know are doing right now.</p>
<p>Which is exactly the point that my detractors seem to have missed. Surely it would be wonderful indeed if all new college graduates had high-paying, fulfilling jobs waiting for them immediately after graduation. Sadly, that’s far from the truth, even for those students with top GPA’s, especially if they majored in unmarketable subjects such as history. One could argue that they should never have chosen such an unmarketable major in the first place. I completely agree, but that doesn’t matter anymore. Whether we like it or not, the choice was made, and so the only relevant question is what they should do now.</p>
<p>Also, the answer to this question, just to say it once again to make sure it is not missed, could be closest to a “Yes,” “No” or “there’s a fair chance yes, and a fair chance no” … and the real difficult decision is for the third, who have a good chance at landing some kind of postdoc position, but aren’t necessarily on some clear path to making it big in academia.</p>
<p>These individuals might want to quit academia at that point, because the uncertainty is frustrating at age 30, or something such as that. Or, they may just take a postdoc position and figure out what to do after. And then, the cycle repeats: they are basically in “PhD position number 2” … there are quite a lot of similarities between non-tenure-track positions and PhD students - they are paid little, have severely uncertain career paths, and need to teach some to earn their living, and don’t really take on PhD students of their own.</p>