So that said, I can totally relate to techies and capitalists. They’re like old family to me. I’m also, tho, happy to do something completely different. Always been more interested in politics and history, in the end.

-incidentally, if the whole career change hadn’t worked out, my backup plan? Why, Patent Law, of course! ;D Luckily, I didnt have to open that parachute.

so there’s one for your data collection…

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After the moon mission, India wants to reach out to Mars and the government is keen to jump onto a possible global bandwagon for this potentially exciting planetary exploration.

Um. Ok. Does anyone want to discuss the idea that manned space exploration has become nothing more than a series of prideful flag-plantings, with almost no emphasis on meaningful exploration, sustainability, or cost-effectiveness? I can easily see India’s space program following America’s after reading quotes like that.

And you’re in the latter camp

I’m on the fence.

I see the seeds of greatness and the seeds of failure and on net, think things will generally be ok. In part, I’m a big believer in the Hard America, Soft America argument (roughly – America’s 20 yr olds are idiots, 30 yr olds brilliant).

I think Sci / Engineering is critical, but i don’t think we’re at a crisis point w.r.t. “underinvestment” in this space. And I certainly don’t see the global economy in quite the same competitive, zero-sum game that the space race was. From a prima facie, Econ 101 standpoint, if India + China have 10x the engineers of the US in the near future, that INCREASES our standard of living.

I also agree that Math / Sci / Eng education can / should be overhauled – it’s no accident that so many of the best techie’s I’ve come across over the years are / were jaded by school and the tech ed process. In >10 yrs in the tech biz (MSFT, silicon valley, startups, big co’s, etc.) I can’t tell you how many times I’ve seen the proverbial USC slacker outperform the CalTech 4.0 ….. the best, most passionate programmers are often the late night hackers rather than the straight-A students.

and the phenomena of the academic underachiever but tech/biz overachiever is a very American one (my USC techie above, Bram Cohen, Marc Andreeson, many other lesser known silicon valley examples, etc.).

And it’s hard to think of a better of example of how f*cked up the education process has become.

where did you get the number regarding the “wizards” making 7 figures ? Without stock options that figure is just too high. Even after allowing for stock options

I’m including all sources of comp – salary + stock options + stock grants. Top salaries within (pure) tech top out in the low 100′s of K. It’s stock that puts you over. And if you avg over several years, the top guys at these firms truly are making 7 figures. Not always, but often.

Put another way, who’d classify as a “wizard” ? At MSFT: only Nathan Myrvhold? or all of MSFT research ? Or the product manager for MS Excel ? Or all product managers ?

the wizards I’m thinking of are the top 2-3 engineers within a 100 person dev team @ MSFT. Within Google, b/c of recent, crazy stock price appreciation, it’s likely that the top 3-4 engineers with a 10 person team are millionaires. At an IBM, it’s probably only the top 2-3 within 1000 who are in the deep 100′s of K.