I find it surprising how low the median salary for chemists is, despite the fact that I thought it ought to be a profitable and academically rigorous field.
Are there just no jobs available these days? Has there been a stagnation in chemistry research? Is chemistry actually easy af and a brainlet meme field? Materials Science these days is looking pretty radical (with voodoo witchcraft like graphene and shit) which makes me think chemists would be in demand.
>Is chemistry actually easy af and a brainlet meme field? fuck no sure, there are chemist jobs which literally require vocational equivalent of high school, but if you consider graphene something deserving to be called witchcraft, then you haven't seen advanced chem shit yet.
Oliver Johnson
it really depends where you live and what resources your country provides for research. Here in croatia chemists are extremely underpaid and there's nothing but to work as a professor in highschools or if you're very good at it you'll maybe get a call to work as a college professor or institute worker. Same thing for biologists and physicists.
even if people have advanced enough education in chem, are there jobs/research positions available to them?
Parker Brown
Most people in that website are whiny lil bitches and have weak character. One person doing his "phd" says he wishes he would have instead "done business and partied with the jocks" or something along those lines. Thats absolutely pathetic and he clearly does not belong in academia
Michael Howard
>the darkside >Used to work in pharma, made pretty good money. Lost my job in the mass layoff`s and had my job shipped overseas. Now I make 500K a year only working only three months a year. My work mostly involves phenylethylamine synthesis. Pretty good employer, good benefits, sometimes stressful though. >— Heisenberg
Colton Parker
This is scary as somebody who is currently walking the fine line between biology and chemistry in university. I'm not interested in making $300k+ starting, but I'd definitely want a high 5 figures job so I can raise a family or something. What kind of chemistry and biochemistry-related jobs are still out there?
Christian Cruz
Chemists are widely used. There's a LOT of jobs and chemist are in high demand, because of their versatility and because there are so few becoming chemists. But somehow you're right, the wage isn't all it could be.
Jeremiah Miller
I'm currently a biochem undergrad, and wanted to go to grad school and do medical research, but yeah the job field and salary stats are depressing. Now I'm thinking after undergrad I'll just go to pharmacy school instead, a career as a pharmacist sounds pretty comfy.
Gabriel Reyes
currently a chemistry graduate student in inorganic chemistry.
at its base, yes its not easy to find a job in chemistry these days, but from what ive seen from graduated students / outsider anecdotes / people who are not online just to circle jerk about how miserable their life is, it isnt that bad.
We graduated our first student from our lab this past year and hes already making 6 figures. (hes in the bay area though, so consider that as well). We have 2 more leaving soon and they both have jobs lined up in teaching. they were not forced down that path, its what they wanted to do.
getting a job in this field, like anywhere else, takes effort. you are getting a specialist degree in a very particular field. There are people who choose to study subjects that simply are not relelvant to the current job market in chem (*cough* computational / physical chemistry). id say about 90% maybe higher of the job market currently is synthetic / analytical work. you mentioned materials science which I personally believe is on the rise.
I actually read the link that posted before i came to grad school which made me switch from organic to inorganic. organic imo seems oversaturated and Ive heard horror stories about mass layoffs simply just to avoid having to pay synthetic chemists too much. inorganic is way cooler, involves a lot of sensitive chemistry, and my project has a lot of application to materials work which, as I said, I predict will have grown by the time I leave. I already see materials applications to research as a buzzword in a lot of journals.
analytical is by far the most employable but also one of the most boring subjects to study.
Regardless of who you are, the job search following grad school takes months on average. Our guy searched for i think 6 before he found a position, and by that time he had left the lab and graduated already.
tl;dr its not as hopeless as people say. There are very employable fields of chemistry, not all of them
Parker Collins
How should one pursue a synthetic track, in university and as a career? I think synthetic chemistry is absolutely mind-blowing, especially when it comes to medicinal and biotech purposes, and I hope to do it as a profession somewhere outside of California with an income that could raise a family and then some. What is your advice?
Luke Adams
>I think synthetic chemistry is absolutely mind-blowing, especially when it comes to medicinal and biotech purposes
the bad news is, so does literally everyone else. the job market is extremely competitive in organic synthesis for drugs / medicine because everyones resume looks the same. "I synthesized and isolated this for application in pharma". the sad truth is, "join the club".
I wanted to go that route as well, but i made sure if i was going to spend the next 5 years in a grueling program, I was going to get a job out of it. I highly suggest looking at all areas of chemistry, get a very good understanding of what you think is interesting, then compare your interests to actual marketable skills. If you come up with nothing more than "medicinal chemistry" then go for it, but make sure you are in a good program.
consider looking into pharmacokinetics or biochemistry projects. I believe the demand is higher for biochemists than an organic guy, but do your research. In terms of getting a job, both coasts are reliable places to look for the biotech industry and chemistry in general. there are a few companies in the midwest, but not like the coasts. do mock job searches as if you have your degree already. how do you make yourself stand out from a literal sea of organic chemists who all want the same thing REALLY REALLY BADLY just like you. the answer should not be "do good work in school" because when you are earning a PhD, everyone does good work. banking on revolutionizing your field as a grad student is not a good bet to make.
There is something to be said for following your dreams though. dont give up if thats truly what you want, but keep in mind everything i said. you are an adult now. you have the brains to figure out exactly what you are getting yourself into.
Evan Collins
You better hope for research, retail pharmacy is hell. Dealing with retarded techs, old people who need an in depth explanation for inbuprofen, poor people faking scripts, dealing with md's that constantly prescribe incomplete/deadly prescriptions for their patients and so on. Pharmacist seems like a great job because of the pay, but it has the stress of a doctor plus a retail aspect.
Brandon Lopez
umm do you get a bunch of indian recruiters rom indeed calling you asking for interviews for 'qa/qc and cgmp' work?
Thomas Long
I enjoy all chemistry, it's just that medicinal chemistry was probably the most interesting field for me, considering that we're starting to understand the biochemical mechanisms for cognition (such as memory) and I wanted to be part of the field.
What is the difference in job skills between biochemists, organic chemists, and chemical biology? It all seems like a lot of overlapping subject matter that requires essentially the same skills (if applied in slightly different contexts).
>There is something to be said for following your dreams though. dont give up if thats truly what you want, but keep in mind everything i said. you are an adult now. you have the brains to figure out exactly what you are getting yourself into.
Thanks for the calm, rational, but encouraging response. I'm still a moron when it comes to job searching. Do you know of any good tips for doing my own research on what biochemist/pharmocokinetics/etc. job opportunities are like?
Lincoln Rogers
The field died out when pharmaceuticals discovered that immunotherapy did magical shit. So in the realm of sciences, chemistry is sandwiched between life sciences and hard sciences. The hard sciences like physics haven't really focused on the molecular field in maybe a century, instead on really small shit like particle physics or really big shit like relativity. Then on the other side of the life sciences, they realized that well chemotherapy isn't that awfully effective, and the body can do better.
So you take the leg work out of the typical chemist's profession -- to synthesize small molecules, and the hard sciences have taken away anything meaningful from academia.
It's been squeezed out. There was a time when chemistry had a larger role in life. It just isn't now and will never be again.
All the interesting matters with material science falls in a closer realm to engineering or physics because they have a stronger scientific background. Look at the Nobel Prizes. The best shot of a chemist winning the award again would be those who developed the lithium ion battery
Jackson Collins
>Then on the other side of the life sciences, they realized that well chemotherapy isn't that awfully effective, and the body can do better.
This is a really stupid copout. A synthetic chemist with a sufficient background in biochemistry could do wonders for medicine. If you understand the properties of endogenous immune-related chemicals, you can develop your own drug to mimic its effects or perhaps negate its side effects.
Blake Gonzalez
>(*cough* computational / physical chemistry oh man i was just starting to like pchem
:*(
Evan Hernandez
Is majoring in Physical Chemistry a suicide?
Colton Watson
I need to know this as well.
I'm a Biochemistry undergrad about to graduate, and I'm considering pivoting fields and going into physical chemistry for grad school. Is this career suicide, Veeky Forums?
Lincoln Jenkins
There is a revolution happening in chemistry right now. Chemists are starting to synthesize molecules that can arguably be called machines.
Austin Bailey
Molecular machines? Outside of academia they don't exist.
Thomas Hughes
Is a Ph.D in Pharmacology a meme? Everybody tells me to just get my PharmD but I really don't wanna be in a clinical setting, I fucking hate old people that can't take their lipitor and zestril correctly.
