How much will definitely depend on lifestyle. My son in phd program - doesn’t drink. doesn’t go clubbing - so spends very little on social entertainment.
He doesn’t have a car and we pay for phone and Netflix. He’s still covered on our insurance. He doesn’t cook much but still doesn’t spend too much on groceries - lots of peanut butter and cereal. He goes out for lunch with other students. Never buys clothes or items for his apartment. And assures us he never needs anything. Nalurally frugal.
He lives well under his phd stipend and banks a lot of his money.
@BunsenBurner, what are your thoughts about the availability of industry (non-academic) jobs for PhDs from non-top 10 schools? D applied to mostly top programs - Ivy and Ivy-caliber schools - but does have an interview at a medical school that, while in the top 10 med schools, isn’t that highly ranked in her field of research.
“Is CEOs COOs VPs of marketing considered to be better than CSOs or VPs of R&D?”
“Considered to be better” by whom? They are different jobs - it depends on what the person wants to do. It’s like asking - is being a doctor better than being an architect? Well, yeah, if you want to be a doctor, and no, if you want to be an architect.
Pizza, why don’t you just stop? Your nonstop attack is getting tiresome. What did I ever do to you? Other than not paying much attention to what you say? Your post does not contribute to anything. What makes a position better? Pay, power/control, opportunity and a few other factors makes us perceive some positions are better than others regardless of one’s inclination.
Igloo, Pizzagirl makes a very valid point. “Better” is a very subjective term, so to answer your question it would have been nice to know what attributes you personally include in “better.” I answered “no” based on my personal subjective interpretation of the term.
Post #101, the answer would be very lawyer-like: it really depends - on the field and especially on the industry connections of the specific PI and the research department in general. If she is not going to pursue a career in academia, she does not need a PhD from an Ivy League school to do well in pharma/biotech, although I am aware of a tiny handful of companies do like to hire those grads exclusively. At the other end of the spectrum there are industry folks who think that a new Ivy grad would be a bit more high maintenance and would demand promotions and move up the career ladder too quickly. What really matters for that first position is how well her technical skills and research track record fit the need of the hiring company. I will add more thoughts when I get a hold of my computer - typing on the iPhone is a PITA.
“What makes a position better? Pay, power/control, opportunity and a few other factors makes us perceive some positions are better than others regardless of one’s inclination.”
But it matters not what other people think. It matters what the person himself wants to do. If you aspire to be a VP of marketing, strive for that. If you aspire to be a VP of R&D, strive for that. It’s simply ludicrous to suggest that one is a “better” career choice than the other.
Perhaps to you but that is not universal. And that is fine if that is what you are seeking. Personally, my first graduate degree would have led to jobs that were not higher paying than those with just my BA/BS but it did open up fields that were otherwise closed.
ETA: Oops, didn’t see the whole next page of comments.
I agree with the posts above that say grad students should be independent of parents for the most part and I definitely believe living like a poor graduate student isn’t a bad thing. My son is living his dream. He was accepted as a MS/PhD student to a top program in his field and he’s thrilled that the university is in a very desirable location, so being poor is not so bad. Unfortunately, the prime location comes with an extraordinary high cost of living. The high cost isn’t just for housing but groceries, utilities (especially water), restaurants, gas - everything. The city doesn’t even have a Walmart or Target and he’s been told it’s because the land prices are too high for them to come in. He will be getting the standard stipend of $24k, but this year he is on fellowship and he gets an additional $5k. He went straight from undergrad to grad, so he had pretty much exhausted the savings he had as an undergrad, so he didn’t have an emergency fund. He worked this summer, but nearly all of his pay went to buy a computer and a bike.
Here’s how we helped out: We helped him figure out his budget and convinced him to live off the future stipend amount this year and use the excess fellowship money for an emergency fund. He gets medical coverage, but we also kept him on our insurance because we could. I honestly don’t know how that would work if there were a major medical expense. We also paid his first month of rent and gave him $400 to set up his new place. We pay for his phone service and we paid for his renter’s insurance. We will pay for plane tickets home. We are also going to fund the initial investment required for a Roth IRA that he can then add to. Other than that, we decided to give him $100 per month. It’s nothing to us, but it’s huge for him. It gives him a cushion - it’s a week worth of groceries, several meals out, a pair of shoes or money for an unexpected expense. We pledged all of the above for his first year; we’ll look at it again at the beginning of next year.
Here is the budget form we found helpful - you will need to add a section for taxes. Fellowships are not taxable income, but stipends are. Typically, taxes aren’t withheld so students may need to pay quarterly estimates.
Best cost savers for him … He has a roommate, he has a bike instead of a car, and he gave up golf and replaced it with surfing, running and biking. He and his roommate share meals and whoever cooks makes enough for lunches the next day. Bottom line, we have learned he can live on $24k per year and because he loves what he’s doing and where he’s living and he enjoys his cohort, he really doesn’t feel poor.
Sorry, my mistake. I asked the one who actually does the taxes, and part of the fellowship was indeed taxable. I was confused by a figure that included OOS tuition and by the difference between taxable year (2015), and the fellowship year (2015-16).
“What makes a position better? Pay, power/control, opportunity and a few other factors makes us perceive some positions are better than others regardless of one’s inclination.”
The two jobs you were asking about are both well-compensated senior professional positions. This is not comparing the VP of a pharma company to the janitor or cafeteria worker. I stand by what I said.
What’s "better? Being an investment banker or a senior Vice President at a PR agency? Being a VP at a biotech company or chief counsel for the same company? These are just vague, non-answerable questions.
