If you get a PhD, get an economics PhD, por Noah Smith:
People often ask me: "Noah, what career path can I take where I'm virtually guaranteed to get a well-paying job in my field of interest, which doesn't force me to work 80 hours a week, and which gives me both autonomy and intellectual excitement?" Well, actually, I lied, no one asks me that. But they should ask me that, because I do know of such a career path, and it's called the economics PhD. (...)
There are PhDs, and there are PhDs, and then there are econ PhDs.
Basically, I think of PhDs as mostly falling into one of three categories:
1. Lifestyle PhDs. These include math, literature and the humanities, theoretical physics, history, many social sciences, and the arts. These are PhDs you do because you really, really, really love just sitting and thinking about stuff. You work on you own interests, at your own pace. If you want to be a poor bohemian scholar who lives a pure "life of the mind," these PhDs are for you. I totally respect people who intentionally choose this lifestyle; I'd be pretty happy doing it myself, I think. Don't expect to get a job in your field when you graduate, though.
2. Lab science PhDs. These include biology, chemistry, neuroscience, electrical engineering, etc. These are PhDs you do because you're either a suicidal fool or an incomprehensible sociopath. They mainly involve utterly brutal hours slaving away in a laboratory on someone else's project for your entire late 20s, followed by years of postdoc hell for your early 30s, with a low percentage chance of a tenure-track faculty position. To find out what these PhD programs are like, read this blog post. If you are considering getting a lab science PhD, please immediately hit yourself in the face with a brick. Now you know what it's like.
(...)
3. PhDs that work. I'm not exactly sure which PhDs fall into this category, but my guess is that it includes marketing, applied math and statistics, finance, computer science, accounting, and management. It definitely, however, includes economics. Economics is the best PhD you can possibly get.
Why get a PhD in economics? Here's why:
Será que o que Smith escreve também se aplicará a Portugal? Dos doutoramentos não sei, mas parece que as licenciaturas em Economia são das com menos desemprego (eu por acaso levei 5 anos até arranjar algo comparável a um emprego, mas reconheço que não sou um caso representativo)
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