For most programming jobs, the salary for "no industry experience, PhD" is lower than the salary for "4 years industry experience, college degree"
So it's not a big moneymaker. But it's certainly not the biggest financial hit you can take in life; having children will cost you a lot more and loads of people do that.
If you look at lifetime salary surveys, you'll find people with doctoral degrees earn more - and some people will say even if a PhD doesn't boost your salary on the day of graduation, your salary will rise faster and higher than your peers. But that could easily be confounded by the fact you've got to have good grades, or ambition towards fancy titles, in order to get a PhD.
There are exceptions, of course; if you want to become a professional academic, if you target a job at a company's research division and choose your research accordingly, or if moves you into a new immigration status. There's no doubt the likes of Chris Urmson and Anthony Levandowski made a lot of money on the back of their PhDs.
So it's not a big moneymaker. But it's certainly not the biggest financial hit you can take in life; having children will cost you a lot more and loads of people do that.
If you look at lifetime salary surveys, you'll find people with doctoral degrees earn more - and some people will say even if a PhD doesn't boost your salary on the day of graduation, your salary will rise faster and higher than your peers. But that could easily be confounded by the fact you've got to have good grades, or ambition towards fancy titles, in order to get a PhD.
There are exceptions, of course; if you want to become a professional academic, if you target a job at a company's research division and choose your research accordingly, or if moves you into a new immigration status. There's no doubt the likes of Chris Urmson and Anthony Levandowski made a lot of money on the back of their PhDs.