It could be worse. You could work for a defense contractor or Big Pharma! :eek: Someone close works for a defense-related company... "oh, so you make bombs that kill babies for a living?". Or someone working in pharmaceuticals might get "oh, you deny affordable drugs to millions living with HIV/AIDS so you can 'research' anti-wrinkle creams"

Interesting thread, me chugging along in med school and research... (thankfully, I am not accumulating debt though)

You should actually feel good about where this thread has gone. At least, when you're sitting in your coach seat, you don't have to lie to your seatmate about what you do. Just remember this line, "That's not my area of expertise."

I would not have kept my silence. Instead, I would have burst into uncontrollable laughter. My jesuit high school was harder than my big state school college, which was harder than law school. For the most part, law school courses come down to a single exam at the end of the semester. You really don't need to go to class (and, after first year, I rarely did).

How about this: "please don't cut me, since if I can't work, that's a little less oil production, and thus higher gas prices." Not very logical, but more than the idea of blaming you for the price at the pump.

Between age 45 and 60, we're talking about a neurosurgeon making $250,000 to $800,000 per year more than the truck driver. That "$1,000,000 behind" will disappear very quickly beyond age 45.

Was thinking of saying "Well actually, my job is to get it out of the ground cheaper." but kept quiet b/c I don't think it would have mattered much. Nice that somebody else gets it though, dhuey! :-)