>>>Who, the cab drivers with PhD?
>>>
>>>The ones I know are "Dr," but a different sort of Doctor. And yes, they clear 100K driving taxis. In some quarters it is regarded as a scandal that these people, whose education is largely publicly funded, go to the 1st world and drive taxis. ;-)
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>>Actually, I was thinking more of the 70s ( at my age it all sort of blurs ) when there were a lot of (apparently native-born) PhDs in philosophy, Medieval French Poetry, Ancient Greek Semiotics etc driving cabs in SF.
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>I know a bunch of young adults working on PhDs at the moment. A wide range of fields, from medieval English literature to neurobiology. That includes a couple in philosophy. Hmmm, is that redundant--a PhD in Philosophy. <g>
>
>What I find more interesting is the number of kids I know who are studying music, theater or art, and hoping to have careers in the field. Both my kids have friends who are pursuing performance careers in New York now. One family we'e been friends with for years has four kids--one's a musician, two are artists, and the youngest is still in college, but planning to go into business.
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>Tamar

Of course if you are going to pursue a career in the performing arts, NYC is the place to do it. If the folks at Julliard think you have a shot, you just might. At least you'll have no illusions about how stiff the competition really is. Of course it also helps if there is no pressure to make enough money to pay off student loans or otherwise help families who have sacrificed greatly to fund your education. A college grad in the fourth generation may be seen as delightfully quirky by the family for being a pottery major, but the first generation college grad is going to feel more pull toward an MBA, an MD or a JD.

I think some careers in the arts are less unrealistic for those coming from a more affluent background. Art history is a very Jackie Kennedy major, in a lot of ways. A successful career in that area depends on not just academic achievement but also is helped along by family connections and the ability to work for a very low salary and live in Manhatten.

I did my undergrad at a small liberal arts college that was traditionally just a prep school for prestigious grad schools. ( the draft situation in 1968 made that less so, but nonetheless that was the atmosphere ) In the sixties majoring in anything like business was like saying you were in trade school, learning to be a welder or something. Liberal Arts was all the rule - which of course was fine for Jeopardy but otherwise useless for making a living without a law degree, MBA or Phd for academia to top it off.

I think later waves of students learned from some of our experience and became a little more realistic about making a living - but in the course of things perhaps a little less educated in the classic sense.

I will say that judging by the experiences of classmates who went into academia ( where I was probably headed if I had not fallen down a rabbit hole ) I do not regret leaving that world before the days of political correctness, 'post-modernism', grade inflation and deconstruction.