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Biocurious for a discussion stimulated by Lou Dobbs on CNN. Watch the YouTube video.
A typical graduate student in our department gets $25,000 per year. A typical post-doc gets $40,000 per year (range 36-45) and a typical Assistant Professor is hired at about $80,000 per year (range 70-100, depending on the university).
What should a post-doc earn? Would salaries be higher if you couldn't hire any foreigners as post-docs?
I couldn't see anything particularly factually wrong with Dobbs report. His guest neatly explained the reasoning behind Bill Gates trying to get more foreign visas (more competition for jobs means people will work for less money - particularly important in computing where the salaries ARE high compared to science). Most Postdocs that I know don't complain primarily about the salary levels (even though it tends to be low compared to jobs of equivalent qualifications), the big complaint is the long term career possibilities.
ReplyDeleteI actually think PDF salaries in Toronto are not bad right now; $40-45k isn't bad (yes, it should be more for someone with a four-year undergraduate degree and at least 5 years of graduate schools). I would put the "proper" amount at somewhere around $40k to start, topping out at $50k. This would put PDFs more in line with technicians who often have less experience and almost always have less education.
ReplyDelete$80k for assistant professors isn't bad in absolute terms, but again, relative to someone with much less education and training in other fields, it's a pittance.
I agree with MartinC: it's not the pay, it's the job prospects.
As for the foreign PDF issue, I don't see it as "us-against-them"; the best people should be hired to do the job, regardless of country of origin. Lou Dobbs is concerned with jobs for Americans; fine, if this is your central concern, then every job you give to a foreigner is one less job for an American. But this assumes the American is an equally-capable PDF, which he or she may or may not be. If the American PDF is less qualified, then the quality of the science drops. You've gained an American job, but your science is going downhill. Somehow, I don't think Lou Dobbs really cares that much about the quality of American science; just the quantity.
ReplyDeleteThe solution is simple: train fewer graduate students, accepting (or graduating) only the very best, and thereby create fewer, but better-trained PDFs; create a reasonable number of tenure-track positions for academically-inclined PDFs, thereby eliminating (or at least ameliorating) the PDF glut.
This will never happen, but that's what should be done...
It's not really a good idea to be in academia if one wants to make a lot of money. Knowledge for its own sake should be the goal.
ReplyDeleteAlso postdocs are still technically trainees, so their salary should take into account that they are being taught alot while working.
That being said, I've heard that the non-salary job benefits are pretty bad compared to what typical grad students get, so this should probably be fixed.
Dobbs misses the other reason why labs require post-docs - to provide the much needed cross/inter-disciplinary expertise, that is available only from an expert from outside the field of research. And then there is also the problem of finding enough domestic graduate student candidates. How does a school in the Midwest attract domestic students? It is amusing to see market worshippers like Dobbs forget their faith every now and then.
ReplyDeleteDO I smell discrimination against foreigners here? I truly believe that without foreigners much of today US research work would not be possible to be carreid ou
ReplyDeleteIt's not really a good idea to be in academia if one wants to make a lot of money.
ReplyDeleteIt's ironic of you to say this, because making a lot of money is exactly the reason why academic institutions engage in biomedical research.
Devin said...
ReplyDeleteIt's not really a good idea to be in academia if one wants to make a lot of money. Knowledge for its own sake should be the goal.
Couldn't agree more. That said, I also have to try to lead a normal life on the side, buy a house, raise a family, eat...you know, luxuries like that. Knowledge is valuable...to a point.
Also postdocs are still technically trainees, so their salary should take into account that they are being taught alot while working.
Agree. And what, exactly, are PDFs being trained for? Permanent jobs. And where are these permanent jobs??? There's the rub.
That being said, I've heard that the non-salary job benefits are pretty bad compared to what typical grad students get, so this should probably be fixed.
PDFs are in a scientific no-mans-land; none of the benefits of being a graduate student, but expected to be more productive for, in some cases, only slightly more money.
It's all about the relative value of individual trainees and employees. It is crazy that in my institution (the largest research institute in Canada), technicians with an M.Sc and 10 years of work experience (totaling an average of 12 years of post-B.Sc training) can make virtually the same amount as a new assistant professor (who would have at least 5-6 years of PhD training and at least 4-5 years of PDF training) , according to Larry's figures. That is wrong.
It is amusing to see market worshippers like Dobbs forget their faith every now and then.
ReplyDeleteYup.
It seems that the free market knows best when Americans are making money and getting jobs; when Americans are down and out, it's time to trot out "socialist" solutions like giving PDF positions to potentially less-well-trained candidates simply because they're American.
"Would salaries be higher if you couldn't hire any foreigners as post-docs?"
ReplyDeleteIn a lot of research areas there is such a glut of PhDs currently that there would still be more local Postdocs available than jobs after getting rid of all foreign Postdocs.
Dobbs also misses a few moe things...
ReplyDeletePostdocs look for international experience, by going to where the work is. The now failed physicist-turned-creationist Guillermo Gonzalez, did a post-doc tenure a the Indian Institute of Astrophysics, because he got to work on observational astronomy there during a solar eclipse. Foreign post-docs are very research driven and usually return to their home country, whether they have qualified there or elsewhere. And labs can hire postdocs because they have the money, and when funding peters out, postdoc hiring declines and research too stagnates.