Hi there
I just wanted to throw another thought into this thread about postdocs/job
opportunities, in a similar manner to what is discussed often on
sci.research.careers.
Why is there all this dissatisfaction? I think it's because for many
people today (if 1% get the jobs, then I guess the other 99%) they don't
know if they have a future in science, except to continue on as a postdoc,
which although mentally rewarding, doesn't help you have a family, put
them through college, retire comfortably etc, etc.
So shouldn't we talk about some sort of birth control on producing new
PhDs? If we have such a glut of PhDs, shouldn't we limit how many we
produce? Other professions limit their numbers so that these problems
don't occur. Unfortunately, given how difficult the funding climate is,
many labs are reliant on the labour of graduate students. So how can we
continue to get our science done, in order to compete for the next grant,
without contributing to the problem of producing more warm bodies who
don't have a very good chance of getting a "real job"?
Or do people out there think that the way things are going is acceptable,
and that we should have an attrition rate of some large percentage, who
can't get a real job? What happens to those 99% who don't get the job?
They hang around for another postdoc or two, and keep trying. Some of
them will get jobs eventually (by this I mean staying in science, either
academics, industry or whatever), but there is still going to be a very
large number who can't get jobs. Should we expect that 50% (OK I'm
pulling numbers totally out of the air here) of our profession will
eventually be weeded out as not "making the grade"?
Sorry, that's the end of my rant - I'm just another scared postdoc who
wonders what I'll be doing in 5 years time - and will it involve science
anymore...
Kim
