IHE: "PhD Job Crisis Built Into System"

[Wahoo Redux]

As one who has tried a few times to dissuade young'uns from entering humanities PhD programs and failed, I found this interesting and probably worthy of commentary.

Ph.D. Oversupply: The System Is the Problem

[Durchlässigkeitsbeiwert]

While most of the article seems to be overgeneralised to the point of being completely irrelevant, the quote below should be framed and used every time somebody argues that it is not that bad since most PhDs eventually do settle into decent jobs:
"But, in fairness, it's not clear who these nonacademic employers are: while most Ph.D.s are finding jobs eventually, little evidence suggests that employers are actively seeking Ph.D.s except in certain applied fields. For most Ph.D.s, the search for nonacademic jobs will always involve fighting against the current rather than riding with it."

[marshwiggle]

An interesting quotation from the paper they wrote, on which the article is based:

Based on a survey of faculty members in PhD-granting political science programs at English-speaking Canadian universities, we find considerable support for both reducing the number of PhD students admitted and reforming curriculum to ensure graduates cultivate skills transferable to non-academic environments. At the same time, faculty members are inclined to believe that PhD students themselves should shoulder the greatest responsibility for career preparation.

And that's why it's unlikely to improve.....

[Hibush]

An interesting quotation from the paper they wrote, on which the article is based:

Based on a survey of faculty members in PhD-granting political science programs at English-speaking Canadian universities, we find considerable support for both reducing the number of PhD students admitted and reforming curriculum to ensure graduates cultivate skills transferable to non-academic environments. At the same time, faculty members are inclined to believe that PhD students themselves should shoulder the greatest responsibility for career preparation.

And that's why it's unlikely to improve.....

The opinion pieces on this topic tend to be written by the constitutionally naive. Those who are shocked to learn that you don't just ease into a nice gig living the life of the mind after getting your PhD.

Is the graduate-education system in some subjects selecting for people who are pathologically blindered? Or perhaps lack a sense of agency over their own lives? That is, do those who have the ability to clue in find paths that don't lead to the same level of disillusionment, so we don't hear from them?

[marshwiggle]

Is the graduate-education system in some subjects selecting for people who are pathologically blindered?

Absolutely. How many kids in high school have known people who worked in construction? Medicine, i.e. doctors or nurses, etc? Now consider how many high school kids know full-time political science faculty. (Since the article was written by poli. sci. people)

By definition, all kinds of kids go into undergraduate programs in areas that interest them, but where they have probably not known a single person making a living with that degree, let alone with a PhD in that discipline working as a full-time faculty member. On the other hand, students who skip university or go into professional fields have likely seen many people, and maybe even known some family member, neighbour, etc. who has a career doing what they're pursuing. In many fields like construction, many kids will get summer jobs in high school doing construction, while the "academic" types will never get any summer- or part-time job doing anything remotely related to that field, so the only exposure they have is purely theoretical, based on their non-representative sample of profs, i.e. the success stories.

[dismalist]

That's quite an article. Where else but in academia can one hear the lament that there is an oversupply of workers? That just means I want more!

The premise that entrants to PhD programs are uninformed is incredible. Hell, they can't all be stupid! The academic job market situation is not news. And word got around in Athens.

Even more appalling is the call for cartelization of the system to reduce the supply of PhD's. This is precisely what would not stand scrutiny in the courts on anti-trust grounds, cf. NCAA ruling and concurring opinion.

System is not broken. System is functioning.

[Wahoo Redux]

I can only speak for the humanities.

The kids are indeed aware of the job market.  They are not clueless as so many seem to think (I suspect it is convenient to believe so).

They want to roll the dice anyway.  There is a kernel of truth to Marshy's post----these neophytes idealize the professor lifestyle----but they are also genuinely motivated by a zeal for their discipline.  I don't know that this is necessarily true for the kids who leave high school and take on a skill or service career.  Most people just want a job they can be successful at, not pursue a passion. 

Our MA program actually brings in money and provides TAs and eventually adjuncts for our classes.

[Parasaurolophus]

<
Even more appalling is the call for cartelization of the system to reduce the supply of PhD's.

We don't often agree, but I agree on this point. I hate how this keeps getting trotted out, because it's really a stupid solution.

It may be worthwhile in some fields, but it's always trotted out about mine, where the supply of PhDs is already quite restricted (IIRC the average incoming PhD class size is 4, notwithstanding a few significant outliers), and has been since at least 2008. One problem is that full-time positions (TT and NTT) have decreased dramatically in that time, much faster than expected. Another is that there are actually quite a few areas of the subject that need to be covered, and you need a fairly diverse set of PhD-granting institutions to meet that demand. Another is that the market is worldwide, and there's no way that Canada, Australia, new Zealand, or the UK should accept that all their philosophers come from Oxford, Harvard, and Princeton--plus a couple more programs, if you want; let's add Toronto and ANU and NYU to the list, just for fun (that's what it would mean to restrict admissions so much that you'd undersupply or equalize demand; talk of restricting the supply just carries water for concentrating PhD-level education in the hands of a few programs). Another problem is attrition, which is quite high; another is that if your entering class is too small, the quality of the program suffers.

There's more, but I'll stop ranting now.

[marshwiggle]

They want to roll the dice anyway.  There is a kernel of truth to Marshy's post----these neophytes idealize the professor lifestyle----but they are also genuinely motivated by a zeal for their discipline.  I don't know that this is necessarily true for the kids who leave high school and take on a skill or service career.  Most people just want a job they can be successful at, not pursue a passion. 

The big difference between academic careers and skill or service careers is that the sunk cost for academia builds over time so it is ultimately much bigger. Someone who takes a year or two of vocational training before working in construction can quit after a couple of years if they're unsatisfied. Someone who has spent a decade (or probably more) and 10's (if not 100's) of thousands of dollars (much of which has become debt) can't psychologically walk away nearly so easily, (even setting aside issues of how the debt will ultimately get paid.)

[dismalist]

They want to roll the dice anyway.  There is a kernel of truth to Marshy's post----these neophytes idealize the professor lifestyle----but they are also genuinely motivated by a zeal for their discipline.  I don't know that this is necessarily true for the kids who leave high school and take on a skill or service career.  Most people just want a job they can be successful at, not pursue a passion. 

The big difference between academic careers and skill or service careers is that the sunk cost for academia builds over time so it is ultimately much bigger. Someone who takes a year or two of vocational training before working in construction can quit after a couple of years if they're unsatisfied. Someone who has spent a decade (or probably more) and 10's (if not 100's) of thousands of dollars (much of which has become debt) can't psychologically walk away nearly so easily, (even setting aside issues of how the debt will ultimately get paid.)

Sunk cost fallacy! :-)

[Durchlässigkeitsbeiwert]

That's quite an article. Where else but in academia can one hear the lament that there is an oversupply of workers? That just means I want more!

Overproduction of lawyers was quite a hot topic few years ago.
Particularly, by 3rd rate schools offering their graduates little chances for a good career in the field (sounds familiar?).

The premise that entrants to PhD programs are uninformed is incredible. Hell, they can't all be stupid! The academic job market situation is not news. And word got around in Athens.

"Being informed" is not a binary choice.
There is a big difference between knowing "the market is bad" and "out of students admitted in the our program in the in the last 20 years 50% did not graduate within 10 years of admission, 20% are adjuncting, 20% are working in the unrelated field, 10% got a permanent position in academia.".
The former is not enough for the informed choice, the latter [barely] is

Even more appalling is the call for cartelization of the system to reduce the supply of PhD's. This is precisely what would not stand scrutiny in the courts on anti-trust grounds, cf. NCAA ruling and concurring opinion.

There is no such thing in the article.
It merely suggests to institutions (and individual professors) to stop incentivising behaviour that is bad for students' well-being

... Another problem is attrition, which is quite high; another is that if your entering class is too small, the quality of the program suffers.

Isn't it indicative of resources being spread too thin?

[Wahoo Redux]

They want to roll the dice anyway.  There is a kernel of truth to Marshy's post----these neophytes idealize the professor lifestyle----but they are also genuinely motivated by a zeal for their discipline.  I don't know that this is necessarily true for the kids who leave high school and take on a skill or service career.  Most people just want a job they can be successful at, not pursue a passion. 

The big difference between academic careers and skill or service careers is that the sunk cost for academia builds over time so it is ultimately much bigger. Someone who takes a year or two of vocational training before working in construction can quit after a couple of years if they're unsatisfied. Someone who has spent a decade (or probably more) and 10's (if not 100's) of thousands of dollars (much of which has become debt) can't psychologically walk away nearly so easily, (even setting aside issues of how the debt will ultimately get paid.)

Most, but not all, humanities grad students have some kind of TA fellowship---at least at the more legitimate schools.  Some do not, of course.  I left my MFA / PhD program without any debt from those programs.  My debt came from earlier. 

[dismalist]

That's quite an article. Where else but in academia can one hear the lament that there is an oversupply of workers? That just means I want more!

Overproduction of lawyers was quite a hot topic few years ago.
Particularly, by 3rd rate schools offering their graduates little chances for a good career in the field (sounds familiar?).

And the number of law school graduates declined, actually quite steeply https://www.statista.com/statistics/428985/number-of-law-graduates-us/ End of story.

The premise that entrants to PhD programs are uninformed is incredible. Hell, they can't all be stupid! The academic job market situation is not news. And word got around in Athens.

"Being informed" is not a binary choice.
There is a big difference between knowing "the market is bad" and "out of students admitted in the our program in the in the last 20 years 50% did not graduate within 10 years of admission, 20% are adjuncting, 20% are working in the unrelated field, 10% got a permanent position in academia.".
The former is not enough for the informed choice, the latter [barely] is

Mercy, how do Phd students decide when to cross the street? Might get hit by a car. Or, they're dumber than lawyers, which is hard to believe.

Even more appalling is the call for cartelization of the system to reduce the supply of PhD's. This is precisely what would not stand scrutiny in the courts on anti-trust grounds, cf. NCAA ruling and concurring opinion.

There is no such thing in the article.
It merely suggests to institutions (and individual professors) to stop incentivising behaviour that is bad for students' well-being

Apologies, when I read such Rather, we face a classic collective action problem: we might all be better off if overall doctoral enrollments decline, but each institution, department and even faculty member benefits from maintaining or increasing their own doctoral student enrollments. I get suspicious.

... Another problem is attrition, which is quite high; another is that if your entering class is too small, the quality of the program suffers.

Isn't it indicative of resources being spread too thin?

[Durchlässigkeitsbeiwert]

And the number of law school graduates declined, actually quite steeply https://www.statista.com/statistics/428985/number-of-law-graduates-us/ End of story.

Mercy, how do Phd students decide when to cross the street? Might get hit by a car. Or, they're dumber than lawyers, which is hard to believe.

The decline in law school graduates number is exactly the type of success story one expects from improved access to information.
Information about employment status and employment type of recent graduates is not only available in some industry-wide surveys, nowadays it is featured prominently on law school web-sites. So, different response by prospective lawyers and prospective grad students to "marked is bad" signs is not surprising, given that the former have easy access to all relevant numbers for the specific program, while the latter are left to guess which program is good and what good means in terms of placement chances.

Apologies, when I read such Rather, we face a classic collective action problem: we might all be better off if overall doctoral enrollments decline, but each institution, department and even faculty member benefits from maintaining or increasing their own doctoral student enrollments. I get suspicious.

I originally read this as a Nash equilibrium example.
Upon review, the actual implementation may look more like a union (mandating the minimum level of support to students), than NCAA cartel (that limited the maximum).

[dismalist]

Upon review, the actual implementation may look more like a union (mandating the minimum level of support to students),

Perhaps outside the US. There will be no implementation of a cartel enforced by a union because in the US because unions are voted for in each establishment, each campus in the case of academia.  That leaves the same collective action problem as before.

Mercy, those law schools are so nice and those lawyers are so smart. Not like Humanities PhD students.