[corobo]

> Basically all algorithms and tools should be passed through them to see if they have commercial potential

That's actually disgusting.. They're supposed to be teaching you, not using you for free labour. They got their cut when you paid for the course..

[academonia]

Post-graduate education is kind of a raw deal for people with undergrad degrees in computational fields. It might actually be worse than "free labor", if you consider the alternative of going to work after your first degree.

In the US, you're looking at paying $20-50k/year, and while most students will get tuition waivers and small stipends, those often disappear if you do any contracting or work on the side to supplement your meager income.

Meanwhile, $100-150k is a reasonable starting total comp right out of school, especially after the recent rash of inflation. And a good worker can realistically double that in the 4-6 years that it would take to get a PhD.

So the opportunity cost is staggering, but wait - there's more. The job market for tech positions has been very hot for the past decade, and the global economy is on the verge of a rebound. If you want to learn about a specific field like ML or aerospace, you can just get a job in that field. Kids graduating today have the option of learning from talented and driven people while earning a reasonable salary.

Research certainly has its place; most of the work that we do is based off of concepts that were pioneered decades ago. But from the perspective of a prospective student in the 2020s, it's a hard sell.

Especially since the current advisor/advisee relationship is rife with perverse incentives. This whole wall of text assumes the best case scenario, where you don't end up in a toxic lab.

[twphysicsphd99]

The toxic lab/advisor is a very real issue.

I've seen some of my smartest friends stagnate to the point of being 9-10th year phds without the ability to navigate the job market. These are people at places like MIT and Caltech.

One of my regrets was turning down an offer at a FAANG to go to grad school in 2014. I finished up in 2020 and couldn't even land an interview despite having a pretty good publication/open-source track record. My advisor was no help on the job market, I felt kicked to the curb.

Took me 1 year to find a job (backend engineer) and I'm still grappling with the fact that I wasted my 20's doing a PhD when I could've at least enjoyed life a little bit more and had a bit of a financial cushion. Honestly, being a swe in industry is a vacation compared to the uncertainty and workload during the phd.

[caddemon]

Almost anybody in a position to develop something worthwhile from their research wasn't paying tuition and was probably getting a stipend. But still the students (and any pre-professor researchers) are vastly underpaid for what their skillset brings and for the hours they typically work. The benefit was supposed to be intellectual freedom...