PhD Numptys

[C0rdelia]

I have met, worked and lived with PhD students who couldn’t tie their own shoelaces or make a cup of tea.
Properly, genuinely stupid and II hate that these numptys get paid more than me.

Hmm. The current stipend for PhD students is around £15k pa and the hours can be long. I calculated I was being paid less than £6 ph. If you're genuinely being paid less than that, OP, I would be reporting your employer to HMRC.

If you're unhappy that people with PhDs are paid more than you, then my advice would be to put an equivalent amount of work into gaining the skills/experience to help you progress. A PhD is three to four years' full time work and the most important attribute is persistence rather than genius. I'm sure anyone who put an equal amount of graft into non-academic development could raise their earning capacity a similar amount. (Probably more, because, as others have said, a PhD is not a route to riches and glory and I'd hope most people don't go into one thinking it is.)

The ‘highly academic people who can barely find their way to the corner shop/their ass with both hands’ thing is a recurring Mn myth, much like the ‘genuinely upper-class people drive around in battered cars covered in dog hair, dress like tramps and are invariably friendly and humble’.

OP, I almost certainly know more people with doctorates than you do. Not one of us lacks basic common sense and life skills.

Maybe drop the chip and study for a doctorate of your own if someone else’s earnings bother you to this extent?

I don’t know their exact salaries but automatically paid more because of the Doctor title

I fucking wish!!

My phd i got £7k pa and that was considered a generous grant. My first post doc i started on 14k.

I left academia to move to the fucking NHS because the pay (for jobs not requiring PhD’s) and conditions- no one and two year contracts, constant relocating for the next contract- was better.

When the pay and conditions in the NHS, a notoriously underpaid field, is better than jobs where your PhD is essential, there’s an issue somewhere..

Despite having a PhD, I can also cook, sew, run a house, bring up two DCs including home schooling them at the moment, pay my bills on time, drive a car, book holidays (and get refunds), organise my office, do photocopying, sort a pile of 300 exam scripts in numerical order, run a multi-£100K grant, and all on less than the average non-PhD graduate.
We had one deliberately incompetent colleague but he was persuaded to leave.

I kind of agree as I've met some incredibly intelligent people with big gaps in knowledge (I.e. how to post a letter, load a dishwasher or that Africa isn't a country). I don't think it makes them less intelligent or a numpty, just those things haven't cropped up for them before. We all have gaps in our knowledge, in some people we just expect more because of their education.

I'll also add that I went to school with a girl who did her phd in marine biology, spent loss of money on it as well as she did numerous tips and stays doing research.

She struggled to find a job in her field and even now she found one she doesn't make a lot.

I've worked with loads of PhDs & I've come to the conclusion that academia attracts a certain personality type. Very knowledgeable in their area & laser focused to the detriment of all else sometimes. Research, particularly individual, doesn't require you to have much social communication skills either. Plus, if you're around people with a similar personality type, you won't always see what you're lacking.

I've met absolutely clever people who've been flummoxed by online holiday bookings. Also, some deliberately cultivate "the clever but thick irl" persona so other people feel sorry for them & do it for them instead. Be wary, just because they act like they can't tie their shoelaces doesn't mean they can't. Look at Boris Johnson,

@C0rdelia, what are you paid nowadays?

My husband is the smartest dumb person I know. He has a PhD but no common sense. He didn’t have common sense before he was a Dr. I have common sense. I’m a PhD student. Correlation does not equal causation and blanket statements are ridiculous.

Oh, and I am self-funding a PhD and not earning so... I’m worse off than you financially op, does that make you feel better?

This whole pay issue is a red herring. With my phd my wage caps out at considerably less had a chosen to go down a different/practical route rather then research.
People with PhD's generally do not have unlimited earning potential. If I had for example done accounting, or marketing, games design, law, medicine, biology etc I would have much higher earning potential then spending my live conducting research post phd. But fortunately I love research and recognise the importance of research (although my husband has always attempted to encourage me to retrain in a practical field which higher earning potential).

The PhD is the only qualification that lowers your earning potential*
*
Yup. If I'd gone into just about any other graduate profession instead of spending years doing a PhD and going into academia I'd be getting paid more right now.

You do realise that it's not uncommon to hold a PhD right? We're a pretty diverse population and most of us are capable of applying common sense.

What field is this that automatically pays people more for having PhDs? The civil service doesn't any more, sadly for me.

The tenuous funding system for research tends to drive out anyone not totally obsessed by it - handy for my department needing to recruit those with research experience, but can mean only tunnel-visioned arrogant tossers make it in science - Jonathan Slack's book 'From Egg to Ego' is brilliant on the subject, including himself as an example.

@worstofbothworlds
The PhD is the only qualification that lowers your earning potential.
. ^love this!

I have a PhD and spent 3 years earning 13.5k then a year earning nothing (write up year is often unpaid) and teaching to earn some money.
I finally got my first full-time job at the age of 29 earning 40k (and that's including London weighting).

I am severely dyspraxic and must be the archetypal stupid person with a PhD. I can’t drive and struggle with a lot of practical things.
But I manage to do my job (I am not paid more because I have a PhD) and look after my child (I am single mum) and even managing to write a book at the same time.

DH has a PhD.

He is unable to cook his own dinner but that is entirely unrelated to his possession of a PhD and directly related to the behaviour of his parents.

I have met male and female people with PhDs who are lacking in common sense and those who have loads of it. However academia does tend to attract both diagnosed and undiagnosed people on the ASD spectrum who have intense focus on specific issues but perhaps no focus at all on how to tidy their desks.

@IloveParmaViolets there are assholes and self centred people in all walks of life.
Research often involves interviewing and involving people. I've been quite involved in Citizen ScIence and I have friends and colleagues who do things like work out what causes women not to attend smear tests, why water projects in developing fail, how to word census questions, how to teach language to children with ASD, how to improve messages on skin cancer.
So yes, you do need social communication skills. Not all academics work in a library or a wet lab.

I finally got my first full-time job at the age of 29 earning 40k (and that's including London weighting)

Don’t forget also that’s nearly 10 years of pension contributions lost as well, so likely you’ll be working 10 years longer...

I am now in a job (again, where phd’s aren’t required) where many of my peers are now retiring. I am 8 years at university behind on pension...

Not to mention I am of an age where if I’d have not gone to uni I would be in a final salary pension scheme and not the piss poor excuse they have now...

I have a PhD. I’m autistic. I’m good at some things, not others. I’m not spiteful, jealous and judgmental though.

I have a PhD. My brother (2 years younger) did an engineering degree then got a job, my cousin (4 years younger) did and engineering job then got a job, my other cousin (7 years younger) did a computer science degree then got a job.

I earn the least, the gap between my earning and the highest of my closest family is around £15k.

I was the last to buy a house and only got a full-time permanent job in 2018. Before that it's 2-3 years on a project before you have to move on.

I wish you automatically got paid more just for having a PhD.

I’m a PhD student. I’m don’t have a Dr title, because I’ve not yet completed my PhD.

I earn nothing from my PhD. In fact, because I’m self-funded, I’m paying out for it.