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Thedogdrinkscoffee@lemmy.ca ⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago

My math prof told me he did his undergrad because he loved math. When he graduated, there were no jobs for undergrads, so he did his masters to see where he would end up. He found the same thing happened. No jobs for a masters of math. He did his Phd and some postdoc work for starvation wages.

He became a professor at my Uni and despite still loving math, was the biggest proponent of students not pursuing pure math degrees. " It should only be pursued in small doses in pursuit of other fields, except in the case of the independently wealthy."

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Gustephan@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago
What’s the difference between a phd mathematician and a large pizza?

The pizza can feed a family of four.

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- MeThisGuy@feddit.nl ⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago
  I would say π , unless the PhD mathematician is also well rounded.
  
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chonglibloodsport@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago
I have a math degree. I am far from independently wealthy. There are plenty of math-related jobs out there if you’re willing to stoop from the lofty perches of pure math. Statistics, data science, risk management, actuarial science, finance, accounting, operations research, optimization, computational mathematics, machine learning/AI.

The list goes on and on and on. Many of these jobs might be quite boring for someone who just wants to work on difficult proofs all day but they’re generally a lot better pay than any academic job below the tenure track (and way better pay than Starbucks).

Life is a lot tougher if you’re into physics or chemistry or biology. There you really do need a PhD to do anything and the research positions are extremely competitive to get.

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- Thedogdrinkscoffee@lemmy.ca ⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago
  Bless you for chiming in as first hand experience of my third hand story. Hoever I think your post reinforces my professors point more than it refutes it.
  
  As someone in the field, you tell me how it really is. I interpret your post as reinforcing my professor’s point, rather than deyracting from it.
  
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  - chonglibloodsport@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago
    Well it’s hard for me to say what your professor really meant. If he meant “there are no jobs paying math undergrads to write proofs” then yes of course, no one but professors or rich parents would pay for that. But all he said was “there are no jobs for undergrads/masters/PhDs” which to me implies that math grads are no better off than high school grads at getting a job, with which I would strongly disagree.
    
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    Thedogdrinkscoffee@lemmy.ca ⁨22⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
    He said the only jobs for math grads were teaching math. High School Teachers in his country didn’t pay well. There weren’t enough professor positions for all the math grads and he struggled for a long time piss poor.
    
    He saw his friends who took business, comp sci or engineering get high paying careers. He discouraged anyone from taking pure math, unless you were rich because it was a “luxury” to study it.
    
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Bob_Robertson_IX@discuss.tchncs.de ⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago
I worked with a guy who had a doctorate in mathematics… He wrote documentation for the software the company produced.

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Fredselfish@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago
My step mom has a master’s in math. She is also dumb as they come. She of course wss a math teacher at a private school. I tnimk its only thing you can do with such a degree. I should of stayed in college and got my English degree. Nor to teach just because I love it. But fuck student loans and how expensive higher education is to pursue.

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- Sculptor9157@sh.itjust.works ⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago
  I’m just glad that you didn’t inherit any of her stupidity.
  
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