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PhD Students Told to Consider Selling Avon Products to Make Ends Meet

theguardian.com

26 pointsandrewl12 comments

In another life I might have considered doing a PhD after I finished my masters. My father (who has a doctorate) quickly put me off that idea. Looking at what you have to do and get paid to do a PhD (at least in the UK) it feels more similar to being a struggling artist busking in the streets while trying to finish their "killer track".

No wonder the most promising students drop out and go on to join finance or tech firms - the pay is an order of magnitude higher.

Finance or tech firms? I think you might have a limited view of the field of PhD candidates

I'm sure there are various other options, but that's not the point. If you ask someone to take a supermarket salary and postpone their life till their mid 30s,then don't be surprised that people choose other paths.

The path that I'm aware of is, assuming a bsc starting at 18 and going for 4 years followed by masters for 1 year and a PhD for 4-5 we have a total of 10 years for age 28 which you could then do 2 single year postdocs to be PI/faculty-ready at 30. I'm not sure where you get mid-30s from.

The PhD programs I've looked at in the hard biosciences all provide a full tuition waiver plus a stipend with solid purchasing power for the area which definitely aren't "supermarket salaries" unless you're talking about management maybe. Maybe those people only want money out of life instead of to do research, but that's just my perspective.

"future leaders in environmental science and sustainable business"

PhD students in a worthless program that would traditionally exist for children of the rich to dabble in get mad at being told to get a job.

In what way are they worthless?

the positions are so few and prestigious (more political than technic) than other that few valid seniors, the workforce would be made of rich elites trying to get busy. elites which would work for free and depress wages and gatekeep certain fields. i dont know if this is the case.

PhD in the UK is a different level of poverty compared with PhDs in any other “Western” country.

Can you imagine graduating at the top of your class and you living in London or near London on less than 20k pounds a year? You can double or triple that income in other phd programs.

The only advice if one really wants to do a PhD is to sample broadly across different countries and PhD programs and choose one that unlocks future options and also pays living wages.

> PhD in the UK is a different level of poverty compared with PhDs in any other “Western” country.

I disagree. I did my PhD in the UK, I did a post-doc in France and the PhD students there seem to have it just as bad, if not worse. From what I've heard from the US it's worse as well, you're expected to carry out teaching duties for pay, and your PI is more likely to string you along for 5+ years and stop you graduating since you're useful and cheap labour.

AFAIK I've only heard of extra duties in the humanities rather than the sciences.

You’re right that France is also bad (also spain) but it’s better to sample around phd salaries in different countries. Roughly in euros per month:

Netherlands: 3000

Sweden: 3000

Switzerland: 4000

France: 1500

Italy: 1000-1500

Spain: 1000-1500

Germany: 2000-3000

USA: 2000-3000

Uk: 1300-1600

Note in many countries you get benefits like insurance, pension, unemployment insurance (basically free money after your PhD).

In summary, there are different tiers, and UK is at the bottom tier comparable to France, Spain, and Italy.

I lived in CA for two years starting a phd. Got 2k/mo, but fortunately on campus housing was only 500/mo. I actually saved 10k over those two years. Super lucky to have already owned a car and be on my parents car insurance tho. Would not recommend again.

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