| Re: Job Offer: Dept. of Planetary Sciences, Univ. of Arizona [message #5667] |
Sun, 28 January 1996 00:00  |
joseph.b.gurman
Messages: 15
Registered: October 1995
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Junior Member |
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In article <4ebdsn$p5g@news.ccit.arizona.edu>, bcohen@lpl.arizona.edu
(Barbara A Cohen) wrote:
> George D. Palo (geop@whidbey.com) wrote:
> : Tim Patterson wrote:
> : >
> : > The Department of Planetary Sciences at the University of Arizona in
> : > Tucson is seeking a highly-motivated and self-directed individual to
> : > fill the position of **Application Systems Analyst, Senior**.
> : >
> : > CASPER is a software package written in Fortran and C for this
> : > purpose,
> : Fortran still exists ... amazing.
>
> : >
> : > Annual salary will be in the range $ 32,500 - $ 36,500.
>
> : You've got to be kidding! Try $72,000 to $96,000. This is scary. The
data from the
> : Cassini Mission will be dependent upon some one making clerks wages.
>
> : George
>
>
> Well, then, write your congresspeople and advise them to increase the
> budgets for programs like NASA and NSF. If projects like Cassini had more
> money set aside for personnel, then people could get paid a going market value.
>
> As it is, the NSF budget is in EXTREME danger because nobody is standing up
> for NSF in congress. If you'd like to see pure science continue in this
> country, now is the time to voice your opinions!!
At the risk of making this sound like alt.science.salaries, perhaps even our
Congresspeople know that people go into science for the love of the subject,
not because they think they can make market value wages doing it.
Believe it or not (I know, not), there are a few scientists out there who
_can_ write professional quality code, and many of them end up doing so for
a living, precisely because they're cheaper than professional programmers.
When we do get skilled programmers working on the scientific analysis of
data, the taxpayers spent $M to $B on, they tend to be (i) young, (ii)
idealistic,
and (iii) convinced the space program is a neat place to work. As the scales
fall from their eyes, they get older, much more cynical, and often have to
help support families --- all the while living in the rather expensive places
much of space science is done (the Bay area and the DC area, for two examples).
Even when they still think the space prgoram is a neat thing, they become
too pricey to be anything but a manager of others who write code. As fine an
example of the Peter Principal as one could imagine.
And if you want to retain a sys admin/network manager who could get a job
with an ISP any day for twice the salary she gets now, what can you offer her?
It all comes down to underpaid recent graduates and unpaid overtime (lots of
it). Faster, cheaper, .... better?
Joe Gurman
--
| Joseph B. Gurman / NASA Goddard Space Flight Center / Solar Data Analysis| | Center/ Code 682.3 / (301) 286-4767 / joseph.b.gurman@gsfc.nasa.gov |
| (This .sig line declared non-emergency.) |
| "Excepted" = employed but unpaid. Wonder if my kids can eat that? |
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