<prompt> Human: Long story here, so please hear out I am desperate:Like all high-schoolers back in time, I got suckered up, cheated on, and lied to by educators, parents, and academic advisor that I will be making good middle class wage income with a biomedical engineering degree at this OK private university. My academic advisor kept telling me the starting salary for biomedical engineers in 80k and thought I would be able to get a job straight out of undergrad. How gullible was I. But I was able to get some scholarship so I ended up finishing 5 years of biomed with 3 co-ops with loans. Realizing that undergrad isnt enough to get a job, I applied to grad school for Masters for biomedical engineering I was basically used like a slave as a research assistant took thesis option and without pay. On top of that, I had to pay full tuition, no stipend or scholarships. All in all, my education loans are 48k only debt I have. Now, that Masters did get me my current position at the same university. I am now working as a research assistant but I feel like I am underpaid and overworked. I conductdesign my own experiments, perform animal surgeries independent very high skillcomplex, do all the post-processing, and generate high quality data. Basically, I do the same work as the post-doc next lab over, but with only a Masters. There was nobody that supervises my experiments other than my PI who is away 90 of the time. I had to teach myself all new skills using internet search. Salary: 38kI feel like I have a lot of skills to offer but I need to translate into real monetary substance. Basically, I want to increase my salary and willing to change careers if necessary. I am already 25 and time is running out. I remember my goal when I was a HS student is to make 100k by 30. This seems so unattainable now...PFers, what do I do?  <response>: So take some personal accountability and find another job. Stop blaming everyone else for your adult decisions. 