Programs Ok, you math majors, what is your job?

[semidevil]

just want to get an idea of my options when I graduate...so all you math majors out there, what do you do for a living?

 

[Gonzolo]

Here is what some math major pals and acquaintances of mine are working in :

- Insurance company
- Gambling machine design
- Cell phone company
- Statistics for gouvernment
- Hygiene product company
- Professor at Univ.
- Teacher at school

Most of them have a second degree (M. Sc., actuarial science, M.B.A. etc.)

 

[franznietzsche]

What about specifically Math PhDs?

 

[Moonbear]

A friend of mine has a math PhD and is working for a large company, but I don't know exactly what he does...he needed security clearance to get the job and isn't allowed to tell anyone what he does (he used to joke with his wife that if he ever wanted to get rid of her, he would just tell her what he did at work and see who came to kill her). He gets to go along on test flights every once in a while to monitor equipment readings. He makes good money, enough that his wife hasn't needed to return to work after having their children! Oh, she also was a math major...and I guess currently unemployed. She never found anything that really excited her to do with the degree.

My other friend who just had an undergrad math degree works as an actuary. I don't think she likes what she does very much. It sounds horribly boring, but she's not much of a risk-taker, so will likely spend the rest of her life in a boring job rather than take a chance and change to a new career. She's really not much of a people person, so even though she passed all the actuarial exams very early in her career, has never had the skills to move up to a management level position, so is rather stuck in a rut. Getting to go on test flights sounds like a lot more fun to me!

 

[AKG]

A friend of mine has a math PhD and is working for a large company, but I don't know exactly what he does...he needed security clearance to get the job and isn't allowed to tell anyone what he does

He doesn't have a bunch of newspapers pinned up around his office with a bunch of yarn strung through the air, does he?

 

[franznietzsche]

He doesn't have a bunch of newspapers pinned up around his office with a bunch of yarn strung through the air, does he?

That is going to be me some day!

 

[sporff]

I've wondered this too. I love math (even though I'm still in early stages of learning it because the only knowledge i have is high school and the rest is self-taught) and someday I'd love to go to school for a degree in mathematics. It's such a beautiful subject to me that I'd love just having at least a master's in it someday.

I've wondered if it would pay for itself though? Would I be able to pay off student loans with the income I'd make after graduating? I really want to go because I love math but that little nuisance called "reality" gets in the way. I'd need to make some money to pay loans off and I'd really rather not work as an actuary for some insurance company or bank crunching meaningless numbers all day.

 

[futb0l]

Gambling Machine Design - No thanks :P I will feel depressed.

 

[franznietzsche]

Gambling Machine Design - No thanks :P I will feel depressed.

Those are MBS and BS, not PhD though, or that's how i understood it.

 

[loseyourname]

I considered, for a brief while, getting degrees in math and economics and then attempting to work my way into a position as a GM for a professional sports franchise. Maybe an MBA or a JD along the way.

 

[Nereid]

Two that I know of: university (now retired), quasi-government scientific research institution (now being readied for privatisation) ... he moved away from 'pure' math and into computing and image processing.