A couple of years ago I would also have said that a PhD is not worth the opportunity cost. I look back to the the time when my wife and I were both fresh out of college and in our PhD programs. We lived _very_ frugally. After housing, food (all cooked ourselves, no take-out or eat-out), transportation (had to live outside of the city), we had maybe $100-$200 left over each month (in 2000-2004 dollars). We had no money to set aside for retirement or investments. We did take out interest free student loans and put them in a CD and paid them back immediately after we graduated, so that helped provide a little investment income. We worked hard to scrape by on a poverty-level stipend without going into debt.
Shortly after we got real jobs, I looked at our friends who went to industry right after college and they were significantly better off, and continued to be better for a quite a while (that whole compounding rewards things).
However, now that I'm senior in my position (real senior, not SV senior label), I have much more stability in my job than my non-PhD friends have. The PhD is pretty valuable for the work I do, and that keeps me as the lead on most of our contracts.
I can't say if I would be better of right now if I went to industry right away and started making money and savings, or if the stability has put me in a better place.
I don't have the massive income as an SV tech job, but I have also never been cut at a layoff, so I don't have to worry about the variability in income.
As an aside, I will say that a PhD is non-trivial and you should probably only consider it if you _love_ the field. If you're just using it to buy yourself some time or to live off the stipend because you can't find work, you probably won't have a fun time.
A couple of years ago I would also have said that a PhD is not worth the opportunity cost. I look back to the the time when my wife and I were both fresh out of college and in our PhD programs. We lived _very_ frugally. After housing, food (all cooked ourselves, no take-out or eat-out), transportation (had to live outside of the city), we had maybe $100-$200 left over each month (in 2000-2004 dollars). We had no money to set aside for retirement or investments. We did take out interest free student loans and put them in a CD and paid them back immediately after we graduated, so that helped provide a little investment income. We worked hard to scrape by on a poverty-level stipend without going into debt.
Shortly after we got real jobs, I looked at our friends who went to industry right after college and they were significantly better off, and continued to be better for a quite a while (that whole compounding rewards things).
However, now that I'm senior in my position (real senior, not SV senior label), I have much more stability in my job than my non-PhD friends have. The PhD is pretty valuable for the work I do, and that keeps me as the lead on most of our contracts.
I can't say if I would be better of right now if I went to industry right away and started making money and savings, or if the stability has put me in a better place.
I don't have the massive income as an SV tech job, but I have also never been cut at a layoff, so I don't have to worry about the variability in income.
As an aside, I will say that a PhD is non-trivial and you should probably only consider it if you _love_ the field. If you're just using it to buy yourself some time or to live off the stipend because you can't find work, you probably won't have a fun time.