Master's Degrees: Are Physicists or Engineers more employable?

[chill_factor]

physicists are much more employable if they did some sort of experimental condensed matter, medical physics or optics (solid state optics). this is of course completely irrelevant information for those who don't want to do these.

the other thing is you don't have to go into debt for a MS physics since many state schools still fund MS students through TA ships.

 

[Devils]

In the end, engineering is a profession along with nursing, doctors, lawyers, etc. They have barriers to entry but anyone can all themselves a scientist or IT consultant.

This is extremely relevant to people over 35 who have employability problems. For engineering jobs you need relevant qualification. For IT jobs anybody can apply.

In the end you have to play the numbers game, work out where the jobs are & barriers to entry. For every tenured physics professor there would be thousands of engineers.

 

[Shaun_W]

I don't know why engineering companies would be reluctant to hire phds but would take in masters.

Because masters graduates have less unlearning to do than PhDs.

 

[3.141592]

That argument does fly, and here's why (haha that rhymes). People who are considering hiring someone with a PhD in physics don't come onto internet message boards to have an in depth debate about the topic. Their personal perceptions and prejudices can play a significant role in the hiring decision. There is often a prejudice that a person with a PhD getting a non-PhD job is just waiting for an academic position to open up and as soon as it does, he will leave for that job, even if the salary is lower. And sometimes it's true. A detailed discussion of why that argument doesn't fly is irrelevant - the only useful information is how to convince a prospective employer that you're not going to do that. Which is sort of silly in some sense, because anyone is going to leave if a better job comes along, but you have to work extra hard to convince them that you want the job they have to offer instead of the job you've spent years training for.

Second this. A large report was carried out in the UK (it's on Google, can't be bothered to find it) about industry employer-perceptions of hiring PhDs. It was virtually uniform in its conclusion: they are reluctant to even interview PhDs. Overqualified (you'll get bored). Over specialised (you'll get bored). Not interested in industry (you'll get bored). Bottom line - you'll leave.

Similarly uniform was the fact that, when companies did bother to interview and hire PhDs, they had nothing but praise for them. Turns out it's almost all prejudice on the employers' part.

But, as pointed out above, you have a hell of a job to do to market yourself. Think of it this way: if you had the equivalent number of years in law or medical school, and came out with a JD or medical degree, wouldn't an employer wonder why you're applying outside that industry?

 

[Locrian]

The three suggestions I've posted in the past for PhD holders seeking employment outside their field (or outside of science) are as follows:

1) Be positive. Say nothing negative about your degree or your future prospects. Negativity is a big strike against you.

2) Be firm about your commitment to change careers. ("I enjoyed my time in academia as a student. However, I will not be continuing my career there.")

3) Have a good reason for switching; bonus points if you educate them. For instance, I enjoyed research, but research can be a surprisingly small portion of a professor's time. I then might say that I enjoyed the field as a student, but there's a big difference between what I was doing in grad school and what I would be doing afterwards.

Someone I respect on another board once stated they didn't hire a newly minted astrophysics PhD for an actuarial job because they assumed they would be taking a big pay cut to switch careers. That's pure comedy, of course; starting pay was probably 50% higher than an astro postdoc.

If you can get into an interview and someone asks you why you're switching, that's your chance to knock down several huge barriers. The thing about PhD's is that many (but not all) of publicly perceived downsides to hiring a PhD are myth, but most of the positives are true.

 

[Mépris]

^
On that note, one thing that I remember Twofish saying about finance, is that everyone with a PhD in science/engineering made it clear that the money was *a* motivating factor. In the movie Margin Call, the aerospace PhD is asked why he's working in a bank by the MD (I think so?), and he just said that it's more or less the same thing, except that the money is better.

With that in mind, if that astro PhD had openly said that an actuarial job would also mean a higher salary, then perhaps things would have worked differently?