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My young friend has a PhD in physics; published and respected. Drives a bus.

There's something missing here.

How long ago did he finish his program? Is your friend limiting his search only to jobs in academia? Is he capable of getting a security clearance? What's your gauge of "respected"?

There are many government and industry jobs for fresh Physics PhDs right now.

Gave up on academia after a year; took another year and a half to find a high school physics teacher job

Yeah, that makes absolutely no sense. There are MANY office jobs that pay better than driving a bus. Does he have mental health problems?

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