[reuven]

My PhD stipend (at Northwestern, a major private US university) was about $1200/month. That's enough for a single, unmarried, childless person who is sharing an apartment with one or more roommates.

It was laughably low for someone like me, married with three children. Health care alone in the US was about $1200/month for my family. Rent was another $1200/month or so. Food cost us a few hundred a month.

Not surprisingly, I ended up doing lots of consulting work during the PhD, something that I had to keep hidden from the program. My wife's earning potential was quite low, so this was the most economical way to do it, if not the most relaxing.

An OK salary is very much relative to the person receiving it, as well as the city in which you are living. We were in Chicago, which is far less expensive than Boston or San Francisco. I can't imagine what we would have done there.

[collyw]

Of course, we should be paying more for people who have wife and kids. Forget meritocracy.

[reuven]

I'm actually not of the opinion that the stipend should be higher for married couples with children -- just that someone in that situation should understand that the PhD student's spouse will need to have a good, full-time job to cover expenses during the period of study.

I do think that it was immoral for the PhD program to charge a fortune for my wife and children to get health insurance, but that is a reflection of the US health-insurance system as much as anything else. And things might well have changed since I was living in Chicago.