[rednafi]

> With the exception of poor pay, I experienced all of those things while working as a software dev for a major company.

Same here. I've worked at grindy startups that made me want to leave the profession altogether—everything from gaslighting by small shop CEOs to firing threats, and even firing a colleague just to show "who's in charge."

But switching companies is always an option, as is switching domains. I did that multiple times without much trouble.

> The instability of the postdoc life sucks if and when you want to have a family.

I thought stability was one of the reasons people choose academia. By stability, I mean a supervisor or program that guarantees a steady influx of cash for a certain period of time.

Yeah, but it comes down to what gives you fulfillment. For me, I need challenging work with a reward in pay that matches the effort and academia doesn't seem to fit that curve.

[goosedragons]

Is short term stability, really stability? I think it's pretty rare to get post-doc contracts longer than 3 years, renewal after that is unlikely especially for a long period of time. You can't really be a post-doc long term and it can easily have you bouncing across the country/countries following funding. It's more stable than freelancing perhaps or maybe a startup.

There's stability in academia as tenured professor but outside that, there really isn't.

[eli_gottlieb]

I've seen a lot of industry outfits fail to survive 18 months with everyone doing the job they were hired for.