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11-09-2015, 08:37 PM
Brian,
I tend to be negative. There are research professors who teach and have grad students and also do research. And, there are research scientists like me who are not professors, and do not teach. The first group generally get 9 months of salary, and can try and raise summer salary from grants. I get zero months of fixed salary: 100% comes from grants. I have managed to build up 9 years of service in my 21 years post-Ph.D. which means I have been getting 40% salary. But the rate is high enough that I probably make more $ than a cashier at Walmart.
You were pretty harsh on what we do. I do a lot of boring stuff, but not much administration. And, I work with scientists who travel the world doing field geology. There are some cool things that I did that I enjoy.
My favorites are:
brainstorming (discussing science for an hour or more to come up with or focus ideas)
Interpretation (for me, of seismic reflection data).
I've been to Antarctica, Malawi, Turkey (a few times), Italy (a few times), Hispaniola (offshore, except for a meeting), New Zealand (a few times). My wife has been to Easter Island 5 times. While the travel sounds great, I actually do not like to travel: I'd be very happy to almost never leave southern New England. This is where I belong. In the late 80s/early 90s I would go out to the islands off of Santa Barbara for field geology, as well as a bit in the National Forest north of Santa Barbara. I liked that. It was not funded, but it was very inexpensive.
Chris
I tend to be negative. There are research professors who teach and have grad students and also do research. And, there are research scientists like me who are not professors, and do not teach. The first group generally get 9 months of salary, and can try and raise summer salary from grants. I get zero months of fixed salary: 100% comes from grants. I have managed to build up 9 years of service in my 21 years post-Ph.D. which means I have been getting 40% salary. But the rate is high enough that I probably make more $ than a cashier at Walmart.
You were pretty harsh on what we do. I do a lot of boring stuff, but not much administration. And, I work with scientists who travel the world doing field geology. There are some cool things that I did that I enjoy.
My favorites are:
brainstorming (discussing science for an hour or more to come up with or focus ideas)
Interpretation (for me, of seismic reflection data).
I've been to Antarctica, Malawi, Turkey (a few times), Italy (a few times), Hispaniola (offshore, except for a meeting), New Zealand (a few times). My wife has been to Easter Island 5 times. While the travel sounds great, I actually do not like to travel: I'd be very happy to almost never leave southern New England. This is where I belong. In the late 80s/early 90s I would go out to the islands off of Santa Barbara for field geology, as well as a bit in the National Forest north of Santa Barbara. I liked that. It was not funded, but it was very inexpensive.
Chris