Molecular Biologist Salary Range - (Apr/09/2009 )

hobglobin on Apr 17 2009, 03:45 PM said:

casandra on Apr 17 2009, 09:38 PM said:

mdfenko on Apr 17 2009, 12:09 PM said:

casandra on Apr 16 2009, 03:54 PM said:

hobglobin on Apr 16 2009, 03:09 PM said:

mdfenko on Apr 16 2009, 08:43 PM said:

hobglobin on Apr 16 2009, 10:51 AM said:

Someone (forgot who, sorry) here had a nice signature:

"Talent does what it can
Genius does what it must
I do what I get paid to do"

That's a statement.

i can't imagine to whom you are referring.

okay my memory is really bad....

..it's ok md...he's much older than Methusaleh so we can forgive him for this.....

if he's older than methuselah then what does that make me (or phage434, for that matter)?

Well, I can do the archeology for you (instead of the math i.e.)........and I couldn't decide between a fossil and a dinosaur... ..you and phage are two of the wisest old men of the forum (oops, did I just make it worse.....).....I also like your sig Md...

You are as old as you feel. But let the sprogs have their fun. Living fossils are above such things.

another factor to consider is starting wage vs wage in 5 years vs wage in 10 years. I'm going to outline the BS-only course because that's the one I know the best.

if you 'only' have a BS, you will probably start pretty low unless you get VERY lucky. the job may not be very exciting. however, you'll pick up skills and a foundation for later.

by the time you've been in the field 5 years, maybe in one or two labs, you're doing a little better. probably not paid well (again, unless you're very lucky and get into the right job) but you're doing better and you have a solid experience base.

at this point, if you've done well at your job, you should be justified in asking for a little more money. by the time you're in the lab 10 years, if you've proven yourself to be a valuable asset, have your name on publications, do some writing, maybe even manage your own lab-slaves...at this point, you'll make anywhere from 35-75K depending on what sort of place you're working. the average is probably 45-50 at this point. the high end would be almost impossible, but you're most likely well over 35K if you have some work ethic and decent hands at the bench.

so....from everything I have heard from experienced parties: unless you go MD-PhD, or get a PhD and step into a very lucky, stable industry-position, your actual salary is not much higher.

would I trade ~15K a year that a PhD would give me for another 6 years of school and poverty? have to write my own grants and deal with even more paperwork than I do now?

it's not worth it to me. because of other factors in my life, I'm very glad I had delayed the decision to go to grad school.

do I ever regret not getting a PhD? sometimes...but only because I may have wasted some of my potential. I love my job. I have a lot of freedom to run my own studies, no one is micro-managing me, and I can do puzzles (science) all day long. I don't like to be an administrator. I could certainly stand to make more money, but no matter how much you make that's usually the way it goes