catherine
At 04:24 AM 19/03/2001 +0000, you wrote:
>>well this just seems bizarre to me given that a) i make substantially
>>more 'an hour' than a person who cleans houses here and b) i make a
>>hell of a lot less than US academics
>>
>>Catherine
>>---------------
>>
>>Catherine,
>>
>>It may seem bizarre, but it reflects conditions I discovered some
>>thirty years ago. Just about any blue collar work was paying a lot
>>more than beginning an academic career. . . . . >
>>I am pretty sure Kelley and Yoshie could come up with similar and much
>>newer stories.
>>
>
>Right, that's why I went into law when I got canned. I am a 1989 Ph.D in
>philosophy from Michigan, a top five grad school. I got a one year job at
>a little liberal arts school in nowhere, Michigan; then a tenure track job
>at Ohio State. That didn't work out, despite (in my case) publishing a lot
>in all the right places--I mean, top-line, mainstream journals, not lefty
>places. I was making, btw, about $35K when I was canned, and I started a
>(relatively low paid) law job at $40K four years later. I might have
>looked forward to making $50K a tenured prof, someday. I am now making
>about $60K in my government law job. (I could go out and get a law job
>starting at $150K, but it would mean working 80 hrs/wk.)
>
>Anyway, when I was canned, I was untouchable: too fired, too red, too old,
>too published. I went into lawe because I wasn't going to be a nomad
>working for slave wages. Basically, unless you get lucky or get canned
>from a top 15 school, your career is over if you don't get tenure at your
>first or second job out of grad school. This despite the fact that, as far
>as I can tell, I am better by conventional standards than about 85% of the
>tenured philosophy faculty in this country. But I am unemployable in
>academe. Fortunately, law is not so limited.
>
>--jks
>_________________________________________________________________
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