I like the way you work it, no diggity

I'd like to take a brief moment to take about the ideas we ABDers have about the job world.  

I have a few ladies in my lab who are in the same boat as I am.  We are all at the same place in our PhD program.  We all plan to defend within a few months of each other.  And, we've banded together to dream of alternate careers.  Erin P will be a baker, Erin W will be a florist, Steph will be a real estate lady, and I will be a musician.  Our adviser laughs when we mention it, but I think we're all at about the place where our fallback careers may have to take shape for us, because we need to maintain sanity in this insane world of academia that we willingly entered.

So, I've got just a couple of months before I plan to be done.  And, by "a couple," I literally mean 2... well, 2.5.  That's crazy.  So, I've been looking around to see what careers are available.  I've been going back and forth between academia and industry alternatives.  It so turns out that I am now qualified for far fewer careers than I was 3 years ago when I had only an MPH.  And, then, I was qualified for fewer careers than before, when I had two BS degrees.  You see, a lot of big pharma and academia careers want the degrees I have PLUS a whole lot of experience that I don't have in order to do the job I want to do.  So, to get experience, we get postdocs to prep for academia, and... I don't know how you get the experience they want for an industry position, because I haven't seen any good intermediate industry positions open up.

Now, working as a postdoc is pretty unappealing to me for a few reasons.  The biggest of those reasons is that my friends who have done postdocs have mostly been really overworked and underpaid.  They do just as much, if not more, work than they did during their doctoral education (meaning 12-16 hr days are a regular thing), and still only make about $35k.  It looks like the NIH has raised the postdoc pay a little bit, at least, so postdocs start at about $40k these days.  But, still...  living in Ann Arbor with a $40k job is doable.  Living in San Francisco with a $40k job really isn't.  Plus, I made far more than that when I only had a bachelor's degree.  I expect a little more money out of the deal when I've got 5 years of school and 2 degrees more than I used to.

Of course, this morning, I just submitted my CV for a postdoc position with NIH funding...  in San Francisco.  So, I can't say that I'm limiting myself to only $100k positions or anything.  But, I'd certainly prefer a great job that I love, that provides me constant fulfillment, that constantly teaches and pushes me, that lets me work from 9-5, and pays at least a little more than I made with an undergrad degree.  So, if any of you know of a job working as an epidemiologist with epigenetic and genetic data that fits those qualifications, let me know and I will take it... even if it's in Lincoln, NE or Lawrence, KS.