Industry or Academia (Career)?

[rpanetta]

To follow on the heels of an earlier posting on the difference between industrial and academic chromatographers- what about career?
I'm currently a post-doc and I have been asking people I know/meet on both sides of the fence before my next step.
From what I've gathered, the highlights (of what's important to me) are:
-Both are equally competitive
-Job security in academia is much better... if you can get tenure... which is difficult, to put it nicely.
-Industry allows you to have a life outside the lab (and the pay is better).
-A University department fosters a better scientific atmosphere than Industrial R&D
-Industrial R&D fosters a better scientific atmosphere than a University department.

The last two points were very interesting because they came from people who moved from industry to academia, or vice-versa. I have yet to determine what exaclty leads to these differing opinions, but it looks to be politics.
What are other people's experiences of academia vs. industry? Government employees are also welcome to chime in.
Cheers!

[skunked_once]

Here's a government employee chiming in. I work for the USDA/Agricultural Research Service and am very happy with my job and the work atmosphere. I was in academia for many years and this job is much like that with most of the positives and less of the negatives such as tenure.