Ph.D.s in America on the decline

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Da story be here.

 

Here's my tired, late-night thoughts on this (having barely read the article).

1) Somewhere in there they've neglected to factor in the "baby boomer" effect. Of course there's fewer PhDs! There's fewer people in that age range (please don't get on me about "age-ism" statistically there has just got to be an average age at which someone has either earned a PhD or they won't. We know there's exceptions because we at degreeinfo are all about exceptions, we are the exceptions.) I would think that you'd need to show a decrease in the percentage of PhDs relative to the entire age-range population. Or something like that. Not just a straight numerical value.

2) Maybe Americans within that age-range are going for the big bucks. All those tenured professorships are tied up by the baby boomers. The younger people, smart as they are, are not wasting their time in a competition they can't win. Get the MBA and make a killing in the business world. Yeah, that's the ticket.
Who needs a PhD?

3) Who cares if China and India produce more PhDs? They all just move to the USA anyway.

It's late.
Jack

 

Debra Stewart of the Council of Graduate Schools rues that the grad schools don't do so well explaining non-academic employment opportunities to prospective doctoral students. Try this one on for size: learn to write interestingly enough that people will actually buy your stuff and then start your own self-publishing business. Or you could make your own academic employment by going together with several degreeinfo buddies to co-found your own university.

 

Steve,

Movimiento Libertario - not your father's Guevara.

 

Of the 60 or so J.S.D. degrees awarded each year, maybe a dozen go to U.S. students. "T'was ever thus", I guess. If the money is better OUTSIDE the Academy, why go deeper into debt just to stay INSIDE the Academy?

 

Probably more practical than Laissez-Faire City.

 

If we founded our OWN University, what would we call it? Kennedy Eastern, maybe?

 

I finished my MBA Entrepreneurship 13 years ago and my MBA Marketing 12 years ago. I've never done much with either, except some sporadic business tutoring. So, no, I am certainly no expert on how to raise venture capital. I think the problem with that thread was that the thread-starter's ideas were perceived as a bit millish. That said, if one developed the business plan and had credible numbers on initial start-up costs and followed that up with three-to-five-year projections for income statement, balance sheet, and cash flow statement, one might be able to round up the investors, if it were profitable.

 

Well, we could ask Gov. Schwarznagger's in-laws if they've still got enough of Papa Joe's Prohibition money left with which to do a hostile takeover on Kennedy-Western and actually run the place the right way.

 

The US produced 50% of the world's PhDs in 1970 and will likely produce only 15% of the world's PhDs by 2010. So says the report.

1. Is this by nationality of the student or nationality of the school?

2. What proportion of the world's population did the US account for in 1970 and what proportion of the world's population will it account for in 2010?

3. Are there countries offering PhDs now (or that will be offering PhDs by 2010) that were not offering PhDs in 1970?

 

Somewhere in there they've neglected to factor in the "baby boomer" effect. Of course there's fewer PhDs!

Valid observation; the number of JDs and MDs is also down relative to peak levels in the 1980s and 1990s. But only by a few percentage points. The decline in PhDs has been much more noticeable.


Maybe Americans within that age-range are going for the big bucks.

See "Big Jobs that Pay Badly", a recent story at CNN/Money. Careers with disproportionate ratios of training to pay include liberal arts professor and academic research scientist. Both of these careers typically require PhDs.


Get the MBA and make a killing in the business world. Yeah, that's the ticket. Who needs a PhD?

The number of MBA degrees issued annually is currently at an all-time high.

 

OK, it's been a long day, a long week and I'm still a bit tired. Despite that, I don't see that you've made your point. It's clear that you disagree but you've offered nothing in rebuttal that might convince someone to your point of view. My point is this:
If some smart person earns a PhD in a non-US country and then uses their resulting marketability to move to the US, work for some US company, or agency or government office, etc, They get their citizenship and become "American," how is this a worse scenario for the country than if they were born here and earned their PhD from a US school? We, as a country, receive the benefit of their skills and knowledge.
Also, you mentioned that this would "hasten the US's decline." I do not concede that there is such a "decline" and would ask that you document this. I do not concede that a decrease in the number of PhD's constitutes "a US decline." I also do not concede that hiring foreign educated PhD's would not "hasten" anything negative.
Just trying to understand your point.
Jack

 

One somewhat-relevant fact: the current regime is anti-science and strangling science budgets.

But watch perhaps for an increase in Ph.D.s in Intelligent Design... Hey, how's that as a business idea for the Kennedy-Western "Universities" of this world - start a Creationism program!

 

Speaking of which: There used to be a school called the Institute for Creation Research listed in Bear's Guide 9th edition (1985)? Anyone know what happened to it?

 

1) Who are you referring to when you say, "the current regime?"
2) Who's science budgets are allegedly being strangled?
Jack

 

Re: Re: Ph.D.s in America on the decline

1. Good question for which I haven't an answer.

2. It's not just percentage but absolute number of Ph.D.s that is down.

3. Another good question for which I haven't an answer but I would point again to the declining number of American Ph.D.s. If the article is not somehow misleading then there is a downtrend in that number.