12 most overrated jobs. (article)

[ls99]

The RV Vema.

Actually this is an early photo, later a huge fresh water tank was added over the top of the bridge. It spanned the full width. Thus when full leaving port, rolled 30 degrees in dead calm waters. A true joyride at 202 feet from stem to stern. The photo does not show the "A" frame added at the stern for hauling air guns and hydrophone strings.

Would be remiss in not mentioning that the ship was Captained by Henry C. Kohler, of Nova Scotia, who was one of the last few licensed Oceangoing Sailing Masters.

[ls99]

The RV Vema.
In editing with adding the Captain's name, the previous post's the photo was deleted by the whatever.

[traineeinvestor]

I can certainly agree about the working hours and stresses of being a lawyer (to say nothing of the skewed income and difficulties in actually getting a job after law school). That said, Dodd-Frank (and some other "reforms") has already been renamed the "lawyers employment act, so lawyer may well move from the worst to the best list next year.

For comparison, a list of "best" jobs:News Headlines

dental hygenist
audiologist
historian
biologist
meteorologist
computer systems analyst
statistician
actuary (seriously)
mathematician
software engineer

Of course, I'd expect a survey of people on this forum to vote for "retirement" as the second best job and put "early retirement" at the top of the list.

[Nords]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Gone4Good To "Photojournalist" I'll add "Freelance writer" (especially for things like travel). Any "job" where your competition is willing to work for free is bound to be an "overrated" one from the perspective of someone actually trying to make a living.

When pronouncing the word "freelance", the emphasis is on the first syllable.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Alan I used to work with an ex Navy pilot who used to fly Tomcats. When I asked why he quit to become a chemical engineer he simply said, "One too many carrier landings".

Or even worse, not landing on the carrier at all...

[Koolau]

Quote:

Originally Posted by W2R I was never miserable at sea! Those were some of the best times of my life. I would have loved the chance to go out more, but I never got to go out any more than most others in my occupation, sadly enough. The techs get all the fun, I swear!

Many years back, I attended a school to learn the use of an analytical instrument. 2 of my classmates were oceanographers (possibly techs rather than degreed - don't recall). Anyway, their duty was to sail for several months at a time, alternating 12 hour shifts, 7 days a week, taking and analyzing water samples. One was male, one female. Though the thought of going to sea sounded interesting, the way they described their duty, it didn't sound like a j*b most would find appealing.

[obgyn65]

Not sure why physician and surgeon made the list. I am not convinced by the explanation given in the article.

Quote:

Originally Posted by MichaelB The list is: Physician Surgeon

[Lsbcal]

Quote:

Originally Posted by obgyn65 Not sure why physician and surgeon made the list. I am not convinced by the explanation given in the article.

Here are the downsides of that profession:

Quote:

While the level of stress that a physician encounters may be slightly less than that encountered by a brain surgeon, that doesn't mean the job is easy by any means. CareerCast.com cites "increased regulations, lower compensation, and the required need to stay abreast of medical developments" as factors that make the job overrated.

Increased regulations: that will sort out, may have to reduce pay a bit to reduce hassles
Lower compensation: coming down a bit from $192K would still be a dream for most Americans
Staying abreast: sounds like it could be a challenging positive
Stress: accept a bit lower pay (lower caseloads) to reduce stress

Sometimes one wonders how much real research has been done before penning these articles.

[FinanceDude]

Quote:

Originally Posted by MichaelB The list is: Advertising Account Executive Flight Attendant Photojournalist Real-Estate Agent Stockbroker Architect Attorney Commercial Airline Pilot Psychiatrist Physician Surgeon Senior Corporate Executive The reasons these jobs are overrated are pretty ambiguous. Declining job prospects and stress are mentioned frequently.

I didn't think there were any stockbrokers left, what do they do?

[Gone4Good]

Quote:

Originally Posted by FinanceDude I didn't think there were any stockbrokers left, what do they do?

Charge people $150 to execute trades through e-trade.

I worked for a broker dealer and we had to execute all of our trades through the company (presumably to monitor insider trading). We also got awarded company stock that I never wanted as part of our compensation. So every year I had to pay my broker hundreds of dollars to pick up the phone and execute a sell order to turn part of my annual compensation into cash. Nice racket.

[Redbugdave]

How come the top two in my book were not listed? Rock Superstar and Dictator? I would be satisfied with being either...

W2R...I work for NOAA and they occasionally ask for people to sign on for a working trip to Bermuda and back. A couple of my friends have gone, but said they had to work taking seawater samples, and it was not a luxury cruise. What? No lounging around? I can't remember the name of the ship, just now. I may volunteer next year...

[W2R]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Redbugdave How come the top two in my book were not listed? Rock Superstar and Dictator? I would be satisfied with being either... W2R...I work for NOAA and they occasionally ask for people to sign on for a working trip to Bermuda and back. A couple of my friends have gone, but said they had to work taking seawater samples, and it was not a luxury cruise. What? No lounging around? I can't remember the name of the ship, just now. I may volunteer next year...

Well, as you saw from the photos I got to go on an occasional cruise but not very often. You should go! They're so much fun, and you really get a much more realistic viewpoint on the data and what they really mean. Most of the work IS pretty menial and the hours are long (well, duh? it's a working cruise, not a vacation. I still loved going). I guess it is considered to be overkill and hard to justify, to send a high dollar scientist on these working cruises very often. Even for government oceanographers it seems to be harder to get time away for even one cruise a year at higher GS levels, much less spending most of our time on cruises - - I guess our time is too expensive. My agency did send me on a few but as someone with your experiences surely would never argue, that is far from the daily lifestyle of most physical oceanographers.

[TromboneAl]

W2R, can you explain how signal processing is involved in oceanography? Do the dolphins send you signals?

[W2R]

Quote:

Originally Posted by W2R Popular delusions seem to be that most/all oceanographers spend a lot of time on ships helping out Cousteau and such, or swimming with killer whales at Sea World.

Quote:

Originally Posted by TromboneAl W2R, can you explain how signal processing is involved in oceanography? Do the dolphins send you signals?

Yes, Al, during my daily routine workdays as I swam with the dolphins at Sea World, they sent me signals.... (just kidding! As I know you were, too)

Physical oceanographic data (current speed and direction, temperature and salinity measurements, and such, from surface to seafloor) are very expensive to gather - - - the ocean depths are less well explored than the moon, as you have probably heard. As a result, we are often trying to make sense of a dataset that is relatively sparse and scant, in both time and in space. Some very sophisticated signal processing techniques have been developed for doing this, and if applied with some understanding and assumptions from applicable known physics, they actually work. Coming from an electrical engineering background, I was familiar with basic signal processing in a data-rich situation but the information these modern procedures can milk extract from a sparse dataset is mind-blowing. My idea of fun...

[martyp]

Quote:

Originally Posted by traineeinvestor For comparison, a list of "best" jobs:News Headlines dental hygenist audiologist historian biologist meteorologist computer systems analyst statistician actuary (seriously) mathematician software engineer

I would take issue with Biologist being a "best" job. I was an engineer at a DOE DNA sequencing facility. The pay for biologists was way below every other scientific discipline. Sort of like the pay ghetto teachers used to be in. The work was repetitive if you don't have an advanced degree.

[Redbugdave]

Just thought of the ship, W2R. It's the Oleander.

[Spanky]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Lsbcal Here are the downsides of that profession: Increased regulations: that will sort out, may have to reduce pay a bit to reduce hassles Lower compensation: coming down a bit from $192K would still be a dream for most Americans Staying abreast: sounds like it could be a challenging positive Stress: accept a bit lower pay (lower caseloads) to reduce stress Sometimes one wonders how much real research has been done before penning these articles.

Despite its downside, the profession of physician remains highly pursued by highly motivated kids.

[Spanky]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Redbugdave Just thought of the ship, W2R. It's the Oleander.

I thought she was an electrical engineer. Anyway, she may have started as one and then changed.

[haha]

Quote:

Originally Posted by FinanceDude I didn't think there were any stockbrokers left, what do they do?

I assume you are kidding. Brokers at places like Merrill gather assets from and hold hands with wealthy people, just like you do with somewhat less wealthy people.

A middle aged guy I met at one of my Happy Hour spots does just that, and makes an excellent living. These guys are funny. Their clients are always making money, no matter what the markets are doing. At least according to the brokers.

Ha

[Walt34]

Quote:

Originally Posted by W2R ... signal processing in a data-rich situation but the information these modern procedures can milk extract from a sparse dataset is mind-blowing. My idea of fun...

I'm glad to hear somebody likes doing that sort of thing.

I'd have been suicidal if tasked with it.

Of course, I was going to have a career fighting crime, corruption and the forces of evil and instead spent far too much time processing shoplifters, writing tickets for expired registration plates, chasing beer-swilling teenagers off shopping center parking lots and writing reports on fender-benders.

But two or three times a year "the stuff hit the fan" and that was the fun part.

[FinanceDude]

Quote:

Originally Posted by haha I assume you are kidding. Brokers at places like Merrill gather assets from and hold hands with wealthy people, just like you do with somewhat less wealthy people.

I get a lot of clients from Merrill Lynch. About 8 years ago, they decided that anyone who has under $100,000 was not worth it to them so they took their advisor away and gave them an 800 number. While that looks good on paper, it cost them a lot of assets, as it tuned out most of those people had much more than $100K, but it was not at Merrill. I should probably send the local Merrill Lynch branch a gift basket for X-mas.

Quote:

A middle aged guy I met at one of my Happy Hour spots does just that, and makes an excellent living. These guys are funny. Their clients are always making money, no matter what the markets are doing. At least according to the brokers.Ha

All the true "stockbrokers" I knew are out of the business, the expansion of Etrade and Ameritrade and Fido drove them out. Most investors are not going to pay $150 or more to trade a stock they can trade on those other sites for $7 or $9 or $29. Our firm is a discount broker, and most of our trades are $29, more than Etrade but not obnoxious.......