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这个主题帖是版友发的，但是作为斑竹，我有奖励权限，请看奖励参考标准 https://bbs.pinggu.org/thread-2578705-1-1.html
NOTE: This post is intended to provoke second thoughts about PhD study and help applicants make informative decision. It neither discourages nor courages your application.
Many college grads in China are thinking about graduate study overseas. But I think the first question you need answer is "Do you really need a PhD degree?" Life is short. Why waste it?
1) Many students go overseas to pursue a PhD degree simply because they are forced to do so by their parents. Chinese parents usually think doing a PhD is always a great choice on the career path, but this is not true and sometimes even pushes students onto a totally wrong career path.
2) Can a survivor of an U.S. or Canadian PhD study successfully find a faculty position? I don't have an official stats. But I can give a very rough and bold guess here.
Most PhD science and engineering PhD grads cannot find a faculty position immediately after graduation. Even after years of Postdoc reseach experience, most still fail to land a facutly position, though many engineering PhDs can find a job in industry. Tons of PhDs from arts programs go to small colleges and work as a faculty. From the perspective of finding a job in industry, probably statistics PhD is one of the best among all science programs.
Now, how about economics PhDs? Probably the question is the concern of most visitors to this website. If you graduate from top 20 economics PhD programs in the U.S. or top 5 in Canada, you have a large chance to find a faculty position in the U.S. or other developed countries. If from top 50 in the U.S., you are likely to have a lottery drawing. Probably the better choice nowadays is go back to China, where the job market is still good.
Next, how about business PhDs？ The program may be one of Accounting , Finance, Marketing, HR or Organizational Behaviour, MIS, Management Science/Operational Management and so on, roughly ranked in the order of easiness of job placement. Usually Accounting, Finance, Marketing, HR or OB constitute the core of Business schools in the U.S. and Canada while MIS, MS and OM may be also a part of some business schools. The system in Europe is a bit different. Generally, most PhD grads from Accounting, Finance, Marketing, HR or OB can find a academic position in a university or college without having to work as a Postdoc for a few more years. In addition, the pay is generally higher than those profs from Sciences and engineerings, and extremely higher than those from arts programs. This sounds attrative. But does this really harginger the bright future for the PhDs in these areas? The answer is probably no. At least the situation is not as good as many Chinese would-be PhDs expected. Why?
The painful point is that many assistant professors from economics, finance, and accounting departments fail their tenure at their initial placement. The failure rate is way too higher than in the science, engineering, and arts departments. What does the failure mean? Unemployed! Those assistant professors from more reputable universities have to relocate to less reputable universities if they are lucky, those who are not lucky or fail tenure from less reputable universities get unemployed. The whole family has to find a new place and a new job to settle down. This makes a huge difference between the U.S./Canada tenure system and the traditional HR policy of Chinese universities' academic staff . Many universities in HK, Singapore, some coutries in Western Europe also adopt this tenure system. This is why the faculty of economics and business departments is made up by a large portion of assistant professors. The recruitment strategy is that almost every year those departments just fire those assustant professors who fail tenure and inject new blood into those deparments. So the tenure system is a combination of elimination and job security.
To be continued. Comments and/or inputs are welcome.
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