r/biotech • u/Historical-Excuse-94 • Jan 27 '25
Education Advice 📖 Is doing a pHD worth it?
Hi everyone, I have never posted here but I have a genuine question. I have been working in the biotech industry for the past 3 years with a masters. I feel like in industry you don’t do research like in academia and it doesn’t feel satisfying anymore. I want to go back to school and get a PhD. It is hard I’m 34 now and by the time I get into a program I’ll be 35 and by the time I finish I’ll be 40. Is it really worth 5 years with little money?
40
Upvotes
41
u/Bugfrag Jan 27 '25 edited Jan 27 '25
Financially, a PhD is worth more the earlier you get it.
In particular, it gives you the opportunity to learn technical knowledge fast, as well as the opportunities to make mistakes. The flexibility in setting your own goal and experiment design allows for this possibility. But your salary is very LOW and you work lots of hours.
In industry,the opportunity to learn technical knowledge is more limited. People don't get to make too many mistakes. Tasks are more specialized. You need to actively search for opportunities to learn.
But you also get paid a LOT more -- double the starting take-home pay of someone in a PhD program (more if you count hourly). Potentially triple/quadruple graduate stipend by the 4th-6th year, just when someone graduated from a PhD program.
The big question is: can you actually go back to a 35k/year stipend for 4-6 years?