I am currently in an undergrad American university. After lurking on LW for many months, I have been persuaded that the best way for me to contribute towards a positive Singularity is to utilize my comparative advantage (critical reading/writing) to pursue a high-paying career; a significant percentage of the money I earn from this undecided lucrative career will hopefully go towards SIAI or some other organization that is helping to advance the same goals.
The problem is finding the right career that is simultaneously well-paying and achievable, with hopefully some time for my own interests/hobbies.
I was first considering becoming a lawyer, but apparently, only the very top law school graduates actually go on to earn jobs with high salaries. In addition, it seems that the first few years being a lawyer are extremely stressful.
Another option is graduate school. The main academic fields I am interested in are government, economics, and philosophy. However, I’m just not sure that graduate school will lead to other careers besides being a professor, and I don’t know if academia is frankly well-paying enough to justify the costs.
Any advice is appreciated, particularly if you have a similar dilemma, have encountered something like this in the past, are in a field that I mentioned, or just if you have any specific information that might help me. Thanks!
I am going to say that academia (in the humanities) is not a good choice if you want to make money, or even be guaranteed a job. Professorial jobs are moving away from tenure-track positions, and towards part-time positions. There are very few professorial jobs and very many people (who are all “the best”) who want them.
I am currently in an undergrad American university. After lurking on LW for many months, I have been persuaded that the best way for me to contribute towards a positive Singularity is to utilize my comparative advantage (critical reading/writing) to pursue a high-paying career; a significant percentage of the money I earn from this undecided lucrative career will hopefully go towards SIAI or some other organization that is helping to advance the same goals.
The problem is finding the right career that is simultaneously well-paying and achievable, with hopefully some time for my own interests/hobbies.
I was first considering becoming a lawyer, but apparently, only the very top law school graduates actually go on to earn jobs with high salaries. In addition, it seems that the first few years being a lawyer are extremely stressful.
Another option is graduate school. The main academic fields I am interested in are government, economics, and philosophy. However, I’m just not sure that graduate school will lead to other careers besides being a professor, and I don’t know if academia is frankly well-paying enough to justify the costs.
Any advice is appreciated, particularly if you have a similar dilemma, have encountered something like this in the past, are in a field that I mentioned, or just if you have any specific information that might help me. Thanks!
I am going to say that academia (in the humanities) is not a good choice if you want to make money, or even be guaranteed a job. Professorial jobs are moving away from tenure-track positions, and towards part-time positions. There are very few professorial jobs and very many people (who are all “the best”) who want them.
Boring Data
Or put in more understandable terms: 100 Reasons Not to go into Academia
Or for amusement’s sake: PhD Comics
Thanks for the information!
I was already leaning away from academia for those very reasons.