>how exactly do you think i'm supposed to support myself and my kid
>on the adjunct wages AND find time to finish the diss AND be
>somewhat available for the kid--forget even having a social life. i
>shell out $8500 in USG SUBSIDIZED housing/elec/gas a year!
>
>i'm tired of the assumptions that i or anyone else stalls around.
>
>practically speaking, there is absolutely NO incentive for me to
>finish, not in my discipline. not an economic one. i can get a
>perfectly happy job as a researcher, writer, editor, etc with the
>master's.
That's exactly what I have been saying. The problems of the scarcity of good academic jobs, low wages of TAs & adjuncts, etc. explain the very high attrition rate in Ph.D. programs (= the rate of grad students abandoning degree programs): 50%, according to Barbara E. Lovitts and Cary Nelson ("The Hidden Crisis in Graduate Education: Attrition From Ph.D Programs" at <http://www.aaup.org/ND00Lovi.htm>).
Yoshie