Note to self: read this before considering grad school
What does one say to a newly-minted Ph.D. in Economics immediately after graduation? One says this:
“Congratulations. You’ve done it. Take a deep breath and be proud of yourself. You’ve not only done it, you’ve landed a tenure-track job. You’ve not only landed a tenure-track job, but the fact that you had more than one offer means that over the next several years you’ll not only be much better paid but you’ll also teach less than you have in the years just past.
“But don’t think your life will be easy. In six years your university will send out for letters, asking outsiders whether you should be given tenure. What the letter-writers will say about you in year six depends on the articles of yours that they have read in year five. Since nobody reads the journals cover to cover anymore, they will read in year five only those articles published in year four that others have told them are worth reading. To get an article published in year four, you must submit the final draft to the journal after year two.
Thus you need, for the next two years, to work harder than you have ever worked in your life: what you produce in the next two years plays an extraordinarily large role in making your long-run academic reputation.”
“I was going to wait until tomorrow before saying that to him,” says one Berkeley professor. “You’re the second professor to have told me that today,” says one newly-minted Berkeley Ph.D.