I Was a Social Science Grad Student Who Sold My Soul to Capitalism.

Here’s what I’ve learnt 8 years later.

Photo by Giammarco on Unsplash

“Alvin, you have a talent for writing and you have a gift for the subject. You could probably do well in academia and get a PhD if you wanted,” my professor and thesis supervisor during my undergraduate days told me.

So when the opportunity to do a masters degree in sociology was offered to me, I thought-why not? I loved the subject, I loved to theorize, and most importantly I was good at it.

But things were not to be.

As I spent the next 2 years reading about Niklas Luhmann’s grand theory of society, tutoring freshies on sociology staples such as C. Wright Mills’ (1959) The Sociological Imagination, I completed my masters’ degree with the realization that I was screwed.

There was no money to be made pursuing this path.

And money was becoming more and more critical as I began to hit my mid-20s. I need money to pay the bills. Plus, there was no no real contribution or impact I could really make to society writing obscure journals and books that would probably have a readership of N=5.

So I made a desperate attempt to jump into the world of business.