To JimblyUK: I understand that funding is a big issue for researchers, but can you explain more about the job security part because I'm thinking that a PhD can still work in academia as professors who get paid about $80k a year.
And can someone give me to a basic summary of the different dual degrees available with PharmD and their career options. I'm thinking about PharmD/MBA and PharmD/MPH. Which one do you guys think is better considering my interest in drug synthesis and teaching? Thank you.
The issue with job security only really applies if you're doing pure research, where research grants pay for everything, including all salaries (yours and lab staff). I'll try to explain how the system works. Obtaining funding is a competitive process. One of the issues with the system is that the grant review process is undertaken by peers who may have their own subjective views regarding your research. Your grant is reviewed by 3 people - it only takes one unfavourable review to make your grant get an unfunded score (or in a lot more cases recently, even zero criticisms can still result in no funding).
Several years ago, for the "bread-and-butter" NIH grants (the R01) approximately 20% of grants were funded. You could submit the same grant (with modifications to improve it) up to 3 times total. A lot of researchers also have more than one R01 at a time. You submit one of these grants every 5 years. So with a 20% funding rate, 3 chances to submit the same grant, 5 yearly applications and multiple R01s possible, you had an excellent chance of success.
There are other grants available too - for example in my area of research, the National Kidney Foundation and American Heart Association. These grants are for less money, but the success rate is a little higher than the R01.
The current fundable rate for R01s has dropped below 10%. So as you can see, there are going to be more people now who don't get their grants. This is less of an issue if you have 2 R01s, but a big problem if you only have one.
A lot of universities where the focus is research are moving away from tenure-track and towards fixed-term contracts (due to funding issues). So if you run out of money you are out. However, even tenure doesn't add that much security - you might not get kicked out but your guaranteed salary may only be 50% of your salary when you obtained tenure (depends on the contract).
It is in the interests of the university to retain people, so a lot have emergency funds to help out when a researcher has funding issues. I know 2 established researchers who have had to rely on emergency money for a period, but eventually they obtained their R01s.
An issue currently is that due to the lower funding rate, more people need help to get by. Grants come with "indirect" costs which go to the University. Some of this money is diverted to emergency funds. Less grants means less indirects..you get the picture. One other problem is that when you are getting by with minimal emergency resources, it is harder to generate preliminary data to apply for grants.
So as the funding rate drops (due to the freezing of the NIH budget), you get more people who can't get funding. They could be doing great research e.g. my boss, but since one of the reviewers of his grant doesn't like the system used (he uses frog eggs) the grant gets a lower score. This is in spite of the fact that this system is well-established, and the findings using them shown to extrapolate to in vivo in mammals multiple times.
On the other hand, yes you can have a PhD and work in academia with job security..but you will be primarily teaching undergraduate classes, and maybe doing no research except projects for undergrad students. In this case, your income comes from the University (via tuition) rather than competitive grants. The costs for the research projects also come from the university, but are short-term and relatively cheap. However, more and more "teaching" universities are expecting Faculty to apply for grants and have their own extensive research program, since it brings in money (and prestige).
Bottom line: If you rely on research grants to pay you and NIH funding goes through a down period (like now) you can get in trouble, to the extent where your lab has to close down. I know one person in this position now. They had an issue where the animal facility screwed up the light cycle in their rat room, and they lost a years worth of work for 5 people, right before an R01 was up for renewal. The University could only help them out a little financially, and it looks like the lab might close down completely. I can think of 5 other researchers off the top of my head that are about to run out of money too, but 4 of those are MDs, so they have a backup.
Teaching positions are less prone to this problem. My Boss always tell me not to worry, grant funding goes in cycles, but as I always tell him "You're an MD - if your lab closed tomorrow you would still be earning $300K+". My Boss is a great guy, so I can be blunt with him
Sorry for writing so much..I get a little excitable about this topic
