>> I work for a manufacturing company about 50 miles away from London,
>
> Wait, I thought you were in Germany?

I moved back to Oxford with that employer in 2010, then moved on to 
where I am now near Cambridge about a year later. I wasn't sure at first 
but am certainly glad I moved.

> I guess the other problem, of course, is that if you're a salesman or an
> accountant or a purchasing clerk... *every* business needs those people.
> If you program computers... well, not that many people actually need
> such a person. (But then, the same goes for CNC operators, presumably.)

It's pretty evenly split between mechanical, electrical and software 
engineers here, about 8-10 of each. We also have 2 people working in a 
machine shop that are CNC operators (amongst other things). On site 
there's in total about 500 people, although a large proportion of those 
work on the production line, and a lot are dedicated to managing the 
rest of the business away from this site.

> But yeah, the general impression I got from Stack Exchange was that
> unless you intend to spend the rest of your life working for a top-tier
> university publishing academic papers, there is basically *no point* in
> possessing a PhD. You might as well go way 4 years' commercial
> experience instead.

As with most academic qualifications it merely shows you are capable and 
willing to learn to a certain standard, the content is often irrelevant 
to your job. Take a look at people in charge of large R&D departments in 
big companies, most of them have a PhD. It's not because they had a PhD 
they got to that position, but the type of person who gets to that sort 
of position is more likely to have got a PhD.

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