I am a 2nd year undergraduate student pursuing the course BS physics. It has been my life long dream to become a physicist and devote my whole life doing research in this wonderful field. But recently i came across an article by a physics professor
http://wuphys.wustl.edu/~katz/scientist.html
Coming from a physicist himself , this article was highly discouraging. Another is a following article from a PhD in physics.
http://thomasswan.hubpages.com/hub/Reasons-for-Leaving-Physics
Is getting a job (with tenure) really that hard? Is it true that we won't be able to do research and work on problems of our interest until and unless we land a tenured job which would most probably come only in 40s? And I have one more important question, can't theoretical physics be done even without landing a tenure , even without getting into a major top university as a professor because anyway he/she does not require funds as much as an experimental physicist does....???? The last question is especially important if the answers to my first two questions is affirmative and maybe if i am not able to make the grade to land a tenured position in future at a top university viz. Caltech, MIT, Berkeley,Stanford etc