In the lab where I did my postdoc, the folks who went on to work for Amazon, Rackspace and Facebook are doing way better than those of us who went to work for universities, the CDC, etc. monetarily.
I have, what is for an academic a great job, and it pales in comparison to what I could make if I retooled for industry.
Heck, I left academia for industry and ended up publishing fewer, but better and more cited papers. It was the first time I was finally given freedom to explore an idea, significant capital, and management support for my ideas (thank you bill c, alan e and urs h).
I'm 10 years closer to retirement as well, able to own a house in the bay area, etc etc. However, I'm quite aware few who go into industry were given the level of research freedom I was.
In the lab where I did my postdoc, the folks who went on to work for Amazon, Rackspace and Facebook are doing way better than those of us who went to work for universities, the CDC, etc. monetarily.
I have, what is for an academic a great job, and it pales in comparison to what I could make if I retooled for industry.