<p>Thinking they will be earning enough to actually support a family? I've met so many incoming freshmen with this mentality. Physicists and chemists are not in demand, and you will have a very very difficult time finding a job after being a minimum of 8 years (assuming you can finish both your masters and phD in two years time each) in school. You'll start off making even less than a fast-food head manager for many years, and you'll most likely retire at 55K/year.Many of these students are very bright and can make it to professional schools to become big time doctors, executives, lawyers, and consultants enrolling in a liberal arts degree and making it to law, medicine, MBA school. It seems, however, that the rate of students enrolling in the physical sciences is increasing. Are most of these students just ignorantly naive, believing that a phD will secure them a comfortable middle-class life?</p>
<p>Having a physical science major does not prevent anyone from attending law school, med school (assuming they have pre-reqs) or an MBA program. And the reason they do it? Maybe because of a love for the subject and a desire to improve society. What’s more valuable to society, another MBA or another physicist? I would argue physicist.</p>
<p>did sschoe2 make another account? lol jk</p>
<p>Jaysorenson: It is almost impossible to maintain a competitive GPA for med-school, any good law-school, and MBA program. Most of the students in these programs are very bright and were the respective stars of their high-schools, all aiming for grad-school since you couldn’t even dream of getting a job with just a bachelors. Profs can only give out so many A’s, so the majority of students will end up with B’s and C’s. </p>
<p>Your last comment is ridiculous. An MBA is much more valuable to society than a physicist is, or their pay wouldn’t be 3 times as much as what the top physicists earn. I’m not complaining at all about salary, since we live in a capitalistic society and scientists only earn so little in comparison to other jobs simply because they are not in demand or needed by society. What’s perplexing is most of these students could easily succeed at a liberal arts degree and go on to a professional school and live a relatively comfortable life.</p>
<p>Actually, physics is one of the math-heavy majors that often gets recruited to do quantitative finance and similar well paying jobs, so job and career prospects are much better than for chemistry (though many of the jobs in question are not physics jobs).</p>
<p>UcBalumnus: Do you have any sources? Because I know quite a few people with masters degrees in physics doing manual labor jobs. Unless you have a physics degree from an ivy league or MIT, you can forget about becoming a quant (which happen to be the greater majority of physics majors).</p>
<p>Glasss: “It is almost impossible to maintain a competitive GPA for med-school, any good law-school, and MBA program.”</p>
<p>So you’re saying that business majors get A’s out the wazoo? Well, what a useful major, free A’s. Hurray!</p>
<p>Wofbharatj: Where did I even imply that? Either way, a physics major who is busting their back to keep a 3.0 GPA will easily hold their own in business classes and have a 4.0 GPA, if they were to switch. How many business majors you think can do exceptional let alone pass a quantum mechanics class? Business majors aren’t exactly known for having sharp minds, IMO.</p>
<p>Then why major in it? Business is all common sense and analysis, something Physics majors can do far better. Math majors too. Science majors can go into business very easily, and it happens quite often actually. I personally think Science majors are more versatile than business majors.</p>
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<p><a href=“https://career.berkeley.edu/Major/Major.stm[/url]”>https://career.berkeley.edu/Major/Major.stm</a></p>
<p>Plus, I know some physics majors who got good paying jobs (but in other math-oriented fields, not physics).</p>
<p>I have worked in engineering and software development for now 20 years. Many job openings have the same broad educational requirements: BS/MS in engineering, math or physics.</p>
<p>Now I will agree that Physics is like Math (my undergraduate major) in that one needs to tailor their degree to more of “applied” in order to take advantage of job opportunities.</p>
<p>ucbalumnus: Berkley’s a public Ivy, again, most physics graduates do not graduate from top schools. These are the exceptions to the rule. Hell, there are many history grads working on wall-street from top schools, now does that mean the greater majority of history majors (who do not attend top schools) will have a good shot at securing a wall-street job? No, and again, “exception rather than the rule”. </p>
<p>wofbharatj: Because I am perfectly fine with a 40k salary, it is enough to live a somewhat comfortable life doing what I love. I could never see myself in business, seeing as I wouldn’t do to well due to factors I’d rather not mention. But that’s for another thread and another time. Many, many students come into the physical sciences thinking they will be earning well into the 6 figures after getting a phD. These same students are baffled and miserably shocked to learn that despite living through some of the most difficult majors any college offers, there isn’t much in terms of compensation and job security like in most other fields. </p>
<p>GLOBALTRAVELER: DO you mind me asking what is your Alma mater? That may have played a key role into securing a job. Again, unless one attends a top school, they couldn’t hope to find a job without getting a phD, and even then, there are like 9,000 phD’s competing for just under 1600 jobs.</p>
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<p>Quantitative finance is not the only alternative type of job that physics majors can shift into. Computer software development is another area, though it helps to have had some introductory computer science courses at least (and I know some who did that, even though they graduated from a school that is not an “ivy or public ivy”).</p>
<p>In any case, there are not actually that many physics and chemistry majors – 73 physics and 33 chemistry out of 7851 graduates in Berkeley’s 2010 class. The small number of physics majors likely means that there is not an oversupply. Chemistry majors are not so lucky since huge numbers of biology majors compete for many of the same jobs.</p>
<p>For comparison, the 2010 Berkeley graduating class had 826 biology majors (MCB + IB), 498 economics majors, 457 political science majors, 346 English majors, 329 psychology majors, 317 business majors, 282 electrical engineering and computer science majors, 252 history majors, and 235 sociology majors.</p>
<p>As far as high school students go, if you are referring to their high school courses, they take chemistry and physics because they are part of the usual set of courses that university-bound students take. Universities typically have admission requirements specifying some number of courses in science, as well as other subjects like English, math, history, arts, etc… Also, chemistry and physics are preparation for university level courses in those subjects needed for engineering as well as science.</p>
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<p>My undergraduate degree is a B.S. Computational Mathematics from that barely Top-50 school called Michigan State University. I went back to school 9 years later and nabbed a M.S. in Engineering (more like a systems engineering management degree) from the University of Wisconsin. I went the software route since I had computer science courses like operating systems, database systems, computer networks and computer graphics (all electives).</p>
<p>“did sschoe2 make another account? lol jk”</p>
<p>This was my first thought too!</p>
<p>Glass I would be interested to hear your background.</p>
<p>I agree though It is more so the life sciences Biology and Chemistry (which is kind of both a life and hard science). High schoolers are bombarded by the message that there is a science shortage and that a “hard science” major is the key to a lucrative career. Companies are even sending their scientists to schools and having open houses. Fortunately that is what makes these forums so great is that people can tell the truth and reach out to people that may not know one of the victims of this scam personally and not have to worry their company will retaliate against them.</p>
<p>BTW scientists are more likely to retire unemployed at age 40 and working at Walmart beyond that.</p>
<p>Really, hard science is a scam and law school / liberal arts degrees are the alternative? Law school is where you fork over 200k to get royally screwed when it comes time to get a job; grad school in science pays you a stipend that most can live comfortably on.</p>
<p>I agree that some fields, like physics, are less marketable than others. However, suggesting law school as an alternative is a complete joke.</p>
<p>Hmm. Glasss and scchoe2. It’s the Glass Shoe!</p>
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This line of thinking is one of the many reasons that this once fine nation is rapidly deteriorating into a glorified banana republic.</p>
<p>Let’s consider all the alternatives you’ve mentioned:</p>
<p>Med school: even a mediocre American med school typically has an acceptance rate in the vicinity of just 10%, and you’ll still need to complete nearly half of a full undergraduate curriculum in Biochemistry just to satisfy the admissions criteria. Moreover, it doesn’t matter how well you can pad your GPA with liberal arts fluff if you can’t also turn out a stellar performance on the MCAT, and (given the subject matter) well-practiced STEM students have an enormous advantage on that exam. Even if you do manage to run the admissions gauntlet, you’re looking at a potentially massive debt load, years of relatively low paying residency work, and (depending upon the specialty you choose–or are accepted into) some brutal hours…even emotional trauma. Medicine can be a very rewarding career for a variety of reasons, but it is by no means a comfortable (or guaranteed) ride to an upper/upper middle class lifestyle. The seven figure surgeon is a very rare bird; most MDs will find themselves in less remunerative roles as pediatricians, GPs/PCPs, local specialists and so forth.</p>
<p>Business school: undergraduate business students are largely worthless unless they also possess the intangibles that truly make for successful executives, entrepreneurs or salesmen (hint: most of these intangibles are difficult or impossible to teach/learn in a traditional academic context, and well compensated executive positions aren’t exactly abundant). The MBA is just as much a waste of time and money as the JD unless you’ve secured entrance into a truly elite program (i.e. you already have years of experience and demonstrated success in business; thus, the MBA becomes something of a formality) or somebody is already paying you to acquire it. Placement rates for most MBA programs are pretty bad.</p>
<p>Law school: oh, dear. You really don’t have a clue, do you? The legal industry is a complete shambles. You’ll come out of LS with enormous debt and dismal job prospects, and if that doesn’t snuff you out then you’re probably looking at temporary document review work, ambulance chasing, or petty divorce cases on a straight commission or (if you’re lucky) a whopping $40k/year salary. Even the desirable “BIGLAW” firms grind the living **** out of their low level associates with very long hours of completely mundane work, which ultimately results in astronomical attrition. Possibly one of the worst career choices you could even consider at this point in time.</p>
<p>Consulting: if that isn’t a ridiculous spin on the “you can do/be anything you want to do/be” tripe that the Boomers have been spitting out for years, I don’t know what is. Consultants are hired for their expertise, which is typically demonstrated through years of practical industry experience–and beyond that, they have to be among the very best at what they do to have any credibility. Guess what recent graduates don’t have? Not even worth commenting on in any further detail.</p>
<p>The long and short of this is that anybody relying largely or entirely on a conventional degree/education to get them ahead is going to end up in mediocrity (at best). And in this country, mediocrity is becoming less and less comfortable with each passing year.</p>
<p>Ucbalamnus: Do you base the reality on what is true for UC Berkeley? Let me guess, if campus food at UC Berkely is good, then it must also be true for every other college throughout the nation? That’s how ridiculous your argument sounds. There are more than 200 physics majors at my school, alone. Also, unless a physics major takes MANY computer science electives, then their chances of securing a job in that industry is very very slim. Math majors have the advantage here, not by much, though. </p>
<p>GLOBALTRAVELLER: That explains it. The engineering masters must have helped tremendously in getting a job, and once you’ve had that much job experience, finding another job wouldn’t be much of a problem. Interesting, though. How about your classmates? Are they doing as well as you are, or do they have phD’s and are having a tough time finding work in both academia and industry? </p>
<p>Sschoe2: There’s really not much to know except that I am a sophomore majoring in physics. I think all the sciences are bleak in terms of employment opportunities, and most of these students are better off doing an easy major and going off to professional school. Aside from anything below a second-tier law school, most other professional programs (dent, pharm, medicine, etc.) will more or less guarantee them a comfortable life. Your last statement is very true, as most of them will live a miserable life outside of their job. Sad, but true. </p>
<p>Js911: If you attend a top-tier school, you’re essentially set for life. I agree, my law-school suggestion may not have been the best, but are you telling me that a student who majors in the liberal arts and goes off to other professional schools (pharm, med, dent, etc.) won’t live a much better life than 98% of all physics and chemistry majors, most of them either being unemployed or working in the private sector earning 40K salaries for the majority of their careers?</p>