• Question: How much does a scientist get paid?

    Asked by bradfarley to Antoine, Daniel, James, Julie, Saima on 14 Nov 2013.
    • Photo: Julie Speakman

      Julie Speakman answered on 14 Nov 2013:

      Hey! This will vary enormously….so depending on whether you work for the public sector (usually jobs in places like universities or hospitals) or the private sector (often big companies) ….but also the branch of science that you’re in (some are better funded than others – so for example if your area is less directly related to the things the government thinks is important at a particular time it is likely to be harder to get money to fund your work, and so there will be less money to pay you!)
      It will also depend on how senior you are. A lot of scientists start off (after their first lot of studies at university) by doing some research in a specific area over about 3 years – this is called a PhD. If you are lucky you can be paid to do this – I think James talked about this earlier in the week. Where I work, Scientists can hold quite senior positions in the hospital (the head of my department is a Scientist) so could earn up to nearly £100, ooo. My pay bracket is something like £30,000 – £40,000.

    • Photo: James Hickey

      James Hickey answered on 14 Nov 2013:

      Hi bradfarley!

      Julie’s answer is entirely correct – how much scientists earn varies on a very wide scale.

      At the bottom of the scale are people like me who are PhD students. I make about £13,500 a year and don’t pay any tax. In case you don’t know, a PhD is further research about a specific topic (like volcanoes, or medical microbiology) and when you finish you become a ‘Doctor’ of your subject.

      After you finish your PhD you can start working your way up the ladder in the same way as any other job. This is how you can make it to the top jobs that Julie mentioned with a £100,000 salary. The most common job after a PhD is called a post-doc (I think this is what Daniel does). In Earth Sciences like volcanology post-docs earn around £30,000 a year.

      But again, like Julie said, how much you earn also depends where you work and what you’re working on. For example, being a scientist for a big company pays much better than working at a university.

    • Photo: Saima Rehman

      Saima Rehman answered on 18 Nov 2013:

      …but sometimes, you are not lucky enough to get a job (like James and Julie got) and you have to work voluntarily, like me…

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