Comment Quant Finance (Score 2, Interesting) 383
(Full disclosure: I'm a recruiter for IT/Quant Finance companies):
If you're really interested in making money and using advanced scientific/mathematical education and experience, quant finance is definitely one way to do it. Most of the quantitative hedge funds I've worked with are pretty anti-institutional: they're trying to attract PhDs, not MBAs, so they try to run their companies like a grad school (with a seven-figure prize for a good dissertation). Stuff like this sounds like exactly what the original poster was asking for.
Unfortunately, C/C++ and (to a lesser extent) Java are the standard languages (although there's one company that uses Ocaml), so a brilliant hacker who happens to love Ruby or Haskell or something less mainstream isn't likely to get a fulfilling role. On the other hand, these companies hire Google-quality people for several times Google's usual salaries, so it's a fair tradeoff; if you can hold onto a quant position for a few years, you'll probably never have to work again.
Unfortunately, C/C++ and (to a lesser extent) Java are the standard languages (although there's one company that uses Ocaml), so a brilliant hacker who happens to love Ruby or Haskell or something less mainstream isn't likely to get a fulfilling role. On the other hand, these companies hire Google-quality people for several times Google's usual salaries, so it's a fair tradeoff; if you can hold onto a quant position for a few years, you'll probably never have to work again.
