I’m trying not to get involved in argument. CC Rules and all.
“A career in composition” can mean many different things, and often does. You might think about Paul Libman as an example of success - two time Richard Rodgers award winner, and composer of Two Scoops of Raisins In Kellogg’s Raisin Bran, Coast Works as Hard As You Do, and producer of the most excellent Oy To The World, A Klezmer Chrsitmas.
The 1000 doctorates in music were half composition and half unspecified.
Not sure why there would be arguments. I am just curious. The composers I know are all concert composers. Musical theater composition is really a different field and a lot of doctoral programs that I know of don’t have much of that kind of work in their programs. I won’t write any more because I am not debating just curious about the perception of the field from the outside.
ps Maybe some programs do have musical theater composers-? Just not in my realm of experience. In a school that does have musical theater program, there may also be collaborative projects between composers and the MT folks. I was puzzled by the term “job as a composer” but see what you were thinking.