A reader writes in:
When applying to graduate programs, the typical sentiment is that it is unwise to go into debt for a graduate degree because, due to lost wages from not working/not advancing a career for 5-6 years, one comes out of a program 'doubly in the hole', so to speak. Since even a funded program has real world costs in lost wages, these costs should not be compounded by paying large tuition amounts, especially in pursuit of a tenuous job market that is likely to leave one jobless in the end.
But, for someone who wants to go into academia in the humanities or social sciences where jobs are so scarce, is this really wise? Say someone could get into a masters program at a top school, perhaps one in the UK or the US, which isn't funded but is regarded extremely highly in one's field, isn't it worthwhile to take on debt for a program like this because it secures a significantly higher likelihood of actual job prospects? Isn't that a better move than taking a funded offer from a decent but not outstanding school, and then very likely not getting a job after? It seems to me that one can take on the explicit debt of a student loan, or the implicit debt of a funded program with unreliable job prospects. The former gives a much better chance at paying back losses, but the latter?
Would love to hear from someone who has tried this route with success. Sometimes it feels like the only people who offer this advice (never pay to do graduate research) are professors who got their degrees 15+ years ago when the job market was less abysmal, and people who went into a mid-level funded program and couldn't find work after. I wonder if there is also a group of those who paid for opportunities (MA programs, visiting student programs) at top universities and managed, through resume additions and/or networking connections, to get themselves into PhD programs with better placement records, who are now employed and paying off their debt, and who we don't hear from.
I will be applying to both philosophy programs and political theory programs, and this question might very well pertain more to political theory. Philosophy appears to have done a better job at releasing its grip on prestige when evaluating applicants, and the MA-prep programs are more prevalent in political theory or history-type programs, but, nonetheless — having done a post-bacc in language study, for instance, seems to increase chances for those looking to study Ancient Phil in the Ivy League. Doing a program in political thought at Cambridge of UCL in the UK is attractive departments with a focus on political phil. Chicago Phil directs its not-quite-there applicants to its MAPSS program in the humanities (students who have done great books MAs at places like St. John's College, or Bard College in Berlin are well represented at Chicago). All of these are expensive and unfunded, and surely there are some students who were not independently wealthy and who did not get into these programs on scholarship.
I'm really glad someone posed this query, as I think it is very important for prospective grad students to get clear on the issues here. Although I'll be curious to hear what others think, here's my answer: I think what this reader describes is a catastrophically bad idea. Let me explain why.
1. This reader assumes that getting into a top MA program is likely to enable a student to get into a PhD program with a better job-placement record, in turn resulting in 'significantly higher likelihood of actual job prospects.' Let us think the actual numbers though. First, I recall coming across a figure a while back that of all students who begin a PhD program, only about 50% ever complete the program and get the PhD. This coheres with my experience. I received my PhD at Arizona, then ranked #12 on the Leiter report and #1 in political philosophy. Even though my program was highly ranked, and every grad student I knew in the program was incredibly intelligent and highly successful in their previous studies (many at MA programs), many of the people I went to grad school with never finished. Why? There are countless reasons. Indeed, I almost never finished. I ran into unexpected personal problems, unexpected health problems, had profound difficulty coming up with a viable dissertation, and so on. Let me be clear: if you have any thought of entering a PhD program, you cannot reasonably expect to be an exception. Stuff happens. Just check out Ruth Millikan's description of her own path through grad school, which included her grad advisor leaving her program, no dissertation supervision, two children, a divorce, a serious back injury, and time in a mental institution. You need to assume that if you enter a PhD program–even a top-ranked one–the chance that you will finish is something like 50/50. That's just the first issue. Second, as the following chart by Jonathan Weisberg (first shared here) indicates, if you're one of the lucky 50% who actually finishes your PhD program, even the best programs only have something like a 50-60% permanent-academic-job placement rate. This means that in even the top PhD programs, only something like 1 in 4 students who start the program will receive the PhD and get a permanent academic job.
2. This reader's email seems to assume that their path through graduate school is going to be 5 or 6 years. However, this is simply a mistake. As this 2019 US News and World Report article points out, the median time to completing a PhD program is 7.1 years. Two things are crucial here. First, this is only the time it takes students to complete PhD programs they enter. It does not even include the 2 years it takes for a previous MA. And make no mistake about it, getting an MA does not typically shorten the time it takes to get a PhD. Before I went to Arizona, I started my grad career for 2 years at Syracuse. Arizona only accepted 3 courses (1 semester) for transfer credit, so I had to basically start my coursework all over. All in all, I spent 2 years at Syracuse and 6 and 1/2 at Arizona (under the median above!), making my grad career a full 8-1/2 years. Let me be clear: this is typical. Indeed, it's not only typical. This brings me to the second issue, which is that the 7.1 year figure above is only a median number. This means that 50% of students who finish PhD programs spend longer than that in the program. I knew students who took 9 years, one who even took something like 13 years. So, you cannot reasonably assume your grad career will be 5-6 years: chances are, your grad career will be something like 7-10 years to PhD, and after all that time you may not even get the degree (I personally know multiple people who spent 7-10 years without finishing). Like many prospective students, I too assumed that's how long it would take. I started grad school at the tender age of 22. I assumed I would be done by 27, get a job, and get tenure in my early 30s. Oh how different reality turned out. I got my PhD by the skin of my teeth at the age of 30 (spending nearly all of my 20's in graduate school), and didn't end up getting a tenure-track job for another seven years. And let me reiterate (since I think this cannot be reiterated enough): you cannot reasonably expect yourself to be an exception. Everyone I knew who entered my Phd programs thought things would be different for them–that others would fail and they would make it through. The sad fact is that many of them learned they weren't the exception the hard way.
3. It is important to realize that if you go into debt to get an MA, your debt is not likely to end there. Funded PhD programs often provide meager stipends that are difficult to live on, and they may only provide funding/stipends for 5-6 years. This can result in additional debt in several ways. First, unless you are incredibly well-disciplined (and many are not), you may need to take out additional student loans to cover living expenses while in your PhD program. Second, you may rack up credit card debt (which can balloon over years due to compound interest). Third, if you end up staying in your program past the 5-6 years you are guaranteed funding, you may need to take out student loans to cover your extra time in the program (and/or take low-paying adjunct jobs at nearby universities). Take me, for example. I began my PhD program with very little debt. By the time I finished, I had something like $60K worth of debt, spread across student loans and credit cards. Although I paid it off relatively quickly after getting a permanent academic job (due in no small part to extreme budgeting decisions), it was an incredible point of stress for me–especially during the time I was flailing in my program, looking like I would never finish. And, of course, if I hadn't been one of the lucky few to get a permanent academic job, I might have ended up in a really bad place.
4. The author mentions that "Philosophy appears to have done a better job at releasing its grip on prestige when evaluating applicants." However, this just doesn't seem to me consistent with the known facts. First, as Eric Schwitzgebel reports, the vast majority of PhD students received their undergraduate degrees from a small number of highly-ranked institutions. Second, as Helen has shown, prestige-bias appears to be no less strong in the academic job-market. Philosophers may dispute prestige bias more than some other fields. However, it is not at all clear given the facts that prestige bias in evaluating applicants has evaporated.
Anyway, these are just my thoughts, and I am sorry that they are so scary-sounding and negative. They may well be influenced by my own path through graduate school, which as you can tell (and I've reported before) was far longer and more tenuous than I ever imagined as an applicant. So, I will be very curious to hear what others think, particularly those who did what this reader discusses (as they asked specifically to hear "from someone who has tried this route with success"). I'll just conclude by saying that I've shared the above thoughts precisely because of how difficult my grad school experience was, and because I saw so many other students go through similar things. It is natural and understandable to be hopeful, optimistic, and excited about pursuing graduate studies in philosophy. And, to be clear, there can be many wonderful things about it. It is just that from my perspective (as someone who deeply regretted entering grad school many times), it is absolutely vital that anyone considering graduate studies in philosophy do so with their eyes open, so to speak.
But these are just my thoughts. What are yours?
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