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Message: [QUOTE="radarlove, post: 685904, member: 20680"] Whatever. If physics is so great, why give it up? Why would you ask if you should trade it in for a grueling, low-paying career if you think so highly of it? Personally, I'd rather get my testicles smashed with a ball-peen hammer than work in a cube on a computer with a buzzing flourescent light above me, but that's me. I also made my life choices a lot earlier than you did. Being accepted at age 35 into a PhD program might impress your parents, but I know exactly how long it takes to finish and how few actually do, so you'll be in your mid-forties looking for your first job, competing with the 28 year-old PhDs. And yeah, sure, the market for PhDs is smokin' hot...not. Yeah, and you haven't gotten around quite yet to making them. You're late out of the gate and your attitude makes me think you should be a bit cautious about rolling the dice in a career that is so based in personal contacts. Right now, if I knew who you were, I would NOT write a letter of rec for you. How's that feel, your first airline contact already doesn't want to work with you? As I mentioned earlier, it sounds like you've already made your decision for physics. Sounds sucky to me, but maybe that's why you came here for support. Well it is, but only for us that made it to the top. Personally, I think you're not going to make it, but then I could be wrong. It sounds to me like you're looking to [i]rationalize, not make [/i]your decision to sacrifice the next 5-10 years in a doctoral/post-doc world, making $2,000/month and doing what (exactly what) your advisor tells you to do. If you came here to hear that the industry sucks, that furloughs suck the life out of you and that pay cuts make for divorces, then you'll find those opinions. On the other side, the time to get started when the industry is in it's worst convulsions, not when it's on the top of it's cycle. It's a cyclic industry. Already the job market at the very bottom (regional F.O. positions for low-paying companies) is as good as it's been in 10 years. By the time you'd make it through, the majors might very well be thriving again. In my experience, it takes pretty much 15 years to make it from scratch to the majors, even if you went the military way, although some military guys take 20. So you're thirty-five and just getting started--you'll hit the majors at 50 if everything goes right (and I don't have confidence it will for you, so don't take this as encouragement) and upgrade times range from 3 (AirTran) to 18 (AA) so it's possible you'll spend little, or no time as a high-earning captain. So stick to your physics and cry in your beer about what could have been. [/QUOTE]

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