<p>Huge waste of time? Depends on perspective. I don’t think so. One gains quite a bit of knowledge when studying just about any discipline in depth. Poor grad students living on ramen in the student ghetto has been the stereo type for many years now. Though the odds may have worsened in terms of getting jobs directly in this field, particularly in academia, it 's not a huge difference . The odds were never good.</p>
<p>The thing that really scares me these days, however, is that there are a lot of students taking out huge grad school loans for studies in field where there is little chance of finding any well paying job. As I said, living poor as a grad student, and even living poor doing what one loves is one thing, owing six figures for it is a whole other. </p>
<p>The number of stipends has been reduced significantly and I am deeply bothered by the number of kids blithely taking on those guaranteed loans that schools are now just integrating into their stipend and tuition remission formulas for their grad students. Some of these students already have undergraduate loans with interest cranking away after graduation. Though one can forestall payments, the interest still is increasing. And many are taking out yet more loans. To do so as a med student or MBA candidate is one thing. At one time, law also had a good payback, but to take out huge loans to be a Classics PHD. ummmmmm, not recommended. I draw the line there. It’s not that it’s just a bad investment, but it can be a recipe for financial disaster for a lifetime., and a high probability of it.</p>