Credential Inflation?

Discussion in 'General Distance Learning Discussions' started by me again, Jun 24, 2006.

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  1. me again

    me again Well-Known Member

    What percentage of people in the United States have a doctorate?

    I once had a link that showed the number of doctorates that were/are awarded each year from about 1960 to the present. Does anyone still have that link?
     
  2. PhD2B

    PhD2B Dazed and Confused

    The Census Bureau estimates the following from a 2004 American Community Survey.

    Bachelor's degree - 17.2%
    Master's degree - 6.7%
    Professional school degree - 2.0%
    Doctorate degree - 1.1%

    I say we have a perceived "credential inflation" on this forum. Schools like NCU have a lot of doctoral students but not many of them are actually graduating with the degree itself. Of all the doctoral students at NCU, only 41 doctorates were awarded this year. In reality what you have is a forum, DI, where is seems like everyone is either looking for a doctorate or earning one. In the context of this forum, remember, your sample is not representative of the population. ;)

    Sources:
    Census Bureau
    NCU
     
    Last edited by a moderator: Jun 24, 2006
  3. RFValve

    RFValve Well-Known Member

    I'm not saying that a PhD glut exists, I'm saying that this seems to be the trend as there is an evident
    glut of MBAs that will conduct to a PhD glut in years to come.

    Here few articles that talks about the MBA glut

    http://www.economist.com/globalExecutive/education/displayStory.cfm?story_id=1618518
    http://my.jobstreet.com/learning/mba2.htm
    http://management.about.com/gi/dynamic/offsite.htm?site=http://www.theage.com.au/articles/2003/10/17/1066364488788.html
    http://www.lewrockwell.com/north/north347.html
    http://www.heraldsun.news.com.au/common/story_page/0,5478,18875617%255E462,00.html
    http://rohitsethi008.mbablogs.businessweek.com/archive/2005/09/19/51657fmjikfs.htm
    http://management.about.com/b/a/035568.htm
     
  4. SteveFoerster

    SteveFoerster Resident Gadfly Staff Member

    Re: Re: Credential Inflation?

    I couldn't disagree more than an MBA glut will lead to a DBA glut. Most people haven't even heard of a DBA, and besides, most people who got less than they expected out of one degree aren't about to rack up more expense on another.

    -=Steve=-
     
  5. RFValve

    RFValve Well-Known Member

    Re: Re: Re: Credential Inflation?

    I don't share your view. Imagine that you are an MBA that needs to differentiate yourself in the market from the others MBAs. You read in the newspaper that NCU offers a program that can be completed in three years part time while you work and you have some financial support from your employer to continue your studies. Don't you think that with the proliferation of online PhDs, the current MBAs would think that they will need the credential to differentiate themselves from the crowd? If not, why they got an MBA in the first place if differentiation was not an issue?
     
  6. RFValve

    RFValve Well-Known Member

    Here few links to good articles about the PhD Glut in north america

    http://www.lewrockwell.com/north/north427.html

    http://delivery.acm.org/10.1145/370000/361997/p181-payne.pdf?key1=361997&key2=7448811511&coll=ACM&dl=ACM&CFID=15151515&CFTOKEN=6184618

    http://eric.ed.gov/ERICWebPortal/Home.portal?_nfpb=true&_pageLabel=RecordDetails&ERICExtSearch_SearchValue_0=ED088548&ERICExtSearch_SearchType_0=eric_accno&objectId=0900000b800eff81

    http://www.aaup.org/Issues/tenure/Ebten2.htm

    http://www.invisibleadjunct.com/archives/000373.html

    http://www.invisibleadjunct.com/archives/000210.html

    "Ph.D. recipients are increasing at an exponential
    rate in nearly every academic area. Of the 340,000
    Ph.D. degrees awarded by American universities between
    1871 and 1971, half were conferred between
    1961 and 1971. Approximately I0,000 Ph.D. degrees
    were awarded in the United States in 1960, 16,000 in
    1965, and 30,000 in 1970. It has been estimated that by
    1975 between 35,000 and 47,000 Ph.D.s will be awarded
    annually"

    "The adjunct position of today is a way for universities to cut costs by exploiting the PhD glut. After 2 or 3 years, as far as I can tell, full-time adjuncts are people who are trapped"
     
  7. Ted Heiks

    Ted Heiks Moderator and Distinguished Senior Member

    Re: Re: Credential Inflation?

    Isn't the term "full time adjunct" pretty much an oxymoron?
     
  8. RFValve

    RFValve Well-Known Member

    Re: Re: Re: Credential Inflation?

    The quote is taken from an article that appeared in invisible adjunct. It basically talks about many PhDs that are unable to find full time work so they adjunct "full time" to make a living normally at many universities.

    Full time adjuncts is a phenomenon that is increasing due to the PhD glut. In Canada, we are starting to create part time faculty unions at many universities to protect those that "adjunct" full time. Unions basicall try to increase adjuct's salaries so those teaching full time as adjuncts can at least make living.

    The fields with more saturation tend to be sciences and arts. It is common for a PhD in sciences in Canada to take many years as post doc before securing full time employment. Some just never make it and become "full time" adjuncts.
     
  9. Ted Heiks

    Ted Heiks Moderator and Distinguished Senior Member

    Re: Re: Re: Re: Credential Inflation?

    I was aware that the phrase "full-time adjunct" was from a quote in the article you posted. I was just wondering whether you or anyone else noticed the irony in the phrase. Correct me if I'm wrong, but I thought the term "adjunct" meant "part-time." At any rate, I'm old enough to remember a few old college faculty of mine who bore the exalted title of "Part-Time Temporary Assistant Professor," which seems to have meant the same thing as "Adjunct." And, yes, college/university administrators are taking advantage of the PhD glut to drive down faculty wages through the overuse of adjuncts (to be read: cheap labor).
     
  10. SteveFoerster

    SteveFoerster Resident Gadfly Staff Member

    Re: Re: Re: Credential Inflation?

    Not to me. "Adjunct" means contractor, and one can do that full time.

    -=Steve=-
     
  11. Bruce

    Bruce Moderator

    Re: Re: Re: Credential Inflation?

    Not really....there are many people eking out a living by being an adjunct with heavy teaching loads at one school, or more commonly, teaching at several different schools at the same time.
     
  12. Michael Nunn

    Michael Nunn New Member

    I agree with you, PhD2B. I think many people here - and I'm getting to know quite a few - forget that we are not representative of the entire population. Nice observation.
     
  13. PhD2B

    PhD2B Dazed and Confused

    Finally, someone who gets it!

    I’ll go out on a limb here, but if only 1.1% of the population in the United States has a doctorate, I would hardly call that credential inflation.
     
  14. SteveFoerster

    SteveFoerster Resident Gadfly Staff Member

    Totally. I made a similar observation about the skewed perception on degree forums recently, but it might not have been on this particular skewed forum. :D

    Also, the Gary North article has been discussed here before:

    http://forums.degreeinfo.com/showthread.php?s=&threadid=23630

    -=Steve=-
     
  15. deanhughson

    deanhughson New Member

    degree inflation

    It's happening in medicine also. Dentists/podiatrists/chiropractors/nurses are going to online medical schools with little chance of ever licensing the degrees but wanting to show it as part of their title,though they are working under their normally gained degree/license.
     
  16. RFValve

    RFValve Well-Known Member




    Too much!! This considering that the proportion of jobs requiring a PhD is not even close to one percent. Take a random sample of hundred jobs from monster.com and see how many require a PhD.
     
  17. Ted Heiks

    Ted Heiks Moderator and Distinguished Senior Member

    Would employers hiring for doctorally-qualified positions even consider advertising at monster.com?
     
  18. PhD2B

    PhD2B Dazed and Confused

    You need to take into consideration that just because 1.1% of the U.S. population has a doctorate doesn't mean that of those all 1.1% are holding jobs or competing for jobs that require doctorates.

    My current job only requires a bachelors degree. A masters degree is considered a plus. A doctorate is actually viewed as a hindrance for the purpose of getting hired in my office. Personally I have no desire to use a doctorate to obtain a job that requires one. Most of these jobs would entail a huge pay decrease for me so it wouldn’t make sense.
     
  19. SteveFoerster

    SteveFoerster Resident Gadfly Staff Member

    Ted's right to question your Monster.com methodolgy, but more that that, even if the proportion of jobs that require a PhD is less than the propotion of the working population that has one, the question is "PhD in what discipline?", since that's a factor as well. If you have a PhD in Finance, there's a job waiting for you somewhere in academia. If it's in English, well, maybe not.

    But even beyond that, couldn't it be that some people do doctoral work for personal satisfaction rather than for employment advancement?

    -=Steve=-
     
  20. me again

    me again Well-Known Member

    LOL Good point!!!!

    Doesn't everyone go to monster.com to find an attorney, an MD or a tenured professor? :eek:
     

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