I graduated with a PhD in engineering in 2006. At graduation, the President of the University told us to get to know our politicians. In the US it is every man for himself and engineering skills cost less in China. Between my stint as a postdoc and as an Adjunct I think it no joke that PhDs need to get representation and organize.

The posts on http://wearethe99percent.tumblr.com/ reflect my experience. My advanced degree and frugal lifestyle has me making steady financial progress, only I've been laid off on a few occasions - wiping out my nest egg and I'm not really that far along. My experience has me convinced that no one in the government has my back. Lucky my wife has an awesome job - after many years of school where she made nothing and accumulated debt - and we are now in a top income bracket. I know what it is like to not have a job yet be willing to work and have 'in demand' skills. I don't live on the east coast otherwise I'd be out there representing the contingent of society that sweated their way through an engineering PhD. At the end of the day I want my 2yr old to go to a nice school and feel proud to live in this country. I don't see it getting better for him (my wife and I have a large income but will never be 'rich' like Bloomberg, Buffet, Gates, etc.) unless we all stand up now for the 99%.

Occupywallstreet may or may not fizzle out. Either way, I think this is the turning point. I hope this occurs to our leaders and convinces Washington to enact actual campaign/lobbyist reform. That is what I see tying together all the OWS concerns: life may not be fair, but for many it has become completely unfair in the favor of the 1%. Seeing them out there I am inspired because I realize that I am not alone. There are many others out there in the same boat that I am in while I watch the 1% prosper beyond all measure or need. The mere existence of 501c3 organizations - put into law by our own congress - is pretty much proof that our current politicians are nearly 100% corrupt beyond anything we've seen in the USA for nearly a century. Anyone in the world can donate to a 501c3 organization anonymously. Anyone. Isn't this a major national security hole? This country has and can do better than that in its elected officials. If OWS gets snuffed out I think the next movement will be larger and more aggressive. I hope OWS wakes up the conscience of our politicians enough to enact reform and/or wakes up enough of the 99% to start electing officials who will fight, actually fight, for reform.

I've moved on from science. In my mind I pursued science as a means to provide society options to advance. What I didn't realize is that most of the country wanted to buy condos in Florida at amazingly inflated prices. I wanted to research methods to produce clean fuels. I wound up in an underfunded computational lab. I stayed with it because I thought it would all pan out. Turns out I would have been much better off in an experimental lab somewhere, probably MIT. The reason for all these computational labs is that computers are cheap and grad students are cheap, experiments are expensive. Science didn't work out for me so, compared to my peers, I got lucky and found a pretty good job in a stable company.

When it comes to education I've come to believe that less really is more. I hope that my country puts every penny it can into educating children from birth to 12th grade. I advise my friend's children to only go into science if your professors literally are begging you to go, give you a ton of money and a scholarship to the very best school in the field. Even in that case think very carefully about your assumptions. Even in that case I pray for their sake that they don't take the offer.

I don't think much of science as a means to resolve social problems. I think that society needs to face its problems and solve them directly. Society only looks to science for solutions when it KNOWS it is really desperate. If this country finds itself in a dumb war I think the politicians, the rich people, and the CEOs are going to find a research/engineering job of the kind that have been outsourced for the past 10 years or so for me really quickly. I still hope that doesn't happen because a lot of people like me, including my son, might die in such a war. I think a great deal more of finding a good job, better yet starting a company, somewhere. Buying the smallest, least expensive, and most comfortable house possible. Try to get a nice backyard or, better yet, a fair amount of land. Raise a nice family. Living within my means. Saving for an early retirement. Avoiding office politics. Getting involved in local politics because I think those really count. Don't try to win anything in local politics, try to get issues resolved in a neighborly, sensible way. Trying to live at peace with my neighbors.

Simple fact that "supply and demand" leads to lower wages? I think there is a large supply of folks able and willing to be the Goldman CEO...why isn't his salary rock bottom like a postdocs?

I agree: you have stated the major problem facing western society, indeed any society, beautifully. I just knew there was a reason to read slashdot...