Posted on 07/08/2012 2:26:24 AM PDT by Cincinatus' Wife
Michelle Amaral wanted to be a brain scientist to help cure diseases. She planned a traditional academic science career: PhD, university professorship and, eventually, her own lab.
But three years after earning a doctorate in neuroscience, she gave up trying to find a permanent job...she took an administrative position at her university, experiencing firsthand an economic reality that, at first look, is counterintuitive: There are too many laboratory scientists for too few jobs.
That reality runs counter to messages sent by President Obama and the National Science Foundation and other influential groups, who in recent years have called for U.S. universities to churn out more scientists.
Obama has made science education a priority, launching a White House science fair to get young people interested in the field.
But it’s questionable whether those youths will be able to find work when they get a PhD. Although jobs in some high-tech areas, especially computer and petroleum engineering, seem to be booming, the market is much tighter for lab-bound scientists — those seeking new discoveries in biology, chemistry and medicine.
.....Although the injection of $10 billion in federal stimulus funds to the NIH from the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 “created or retained” 50,000 science jobs, according to the NIH, that money is running dry, putting those positions at risk....
....“I’ve listened to this stuff on the news about how we need more scientists and engineers,” she said. “I’m thinking, ‘What are you talking about?’ We’re here. We need something to do besides manual labor for another academic person.”
[Kim] Haas, the former drug company chemist, has even harsher words.....Haas said of her daughter. “She loves chemistry, loves math. I tell her, ‘Don’t go into science.’ I’ve made that very clear to her.”
(Excerpt) Read more at washingtonpost.com ...
You are spot on. Further, because Obamacare will further break the US bank there will be fewer and fewer dollars available for federal research grants. I know there are plenty here who don't think the federal government should be funding research, but unless there is an alternative there will be a marked reduction in American science, and this will put us behind in the world.
In my experience, there’s no better way to sabotage a product-development project than to let Ph.D’s run it.
I'm an MD, not a PhD, but the statement you make is overgeneralized. At some point in your life you likely had, or will have, some medication or medical intervention that was developed at least in part based on the efforts of PhDs. Having said that, those PhDs who traditionally vote democrat are screwing themselves, as well as the country in general.
I agree with the general premise of your comment, but would point out that pouring money into big pharma would likely have the same consequences. It is very difficult to develop viable therapeutics, which is why they wind up often being so expensive (until they are off patent). I think one of the big problems is that the people giving out money get suckered by hype too often (this includes venture capitalists as well as government funding agencies). True science doesn't need hype. Science has gone Hollywood to a great degree, and this has hurt it immensely.
I have a Chemistry degree and when I decided I wanted to go back to school, I decided to get an MBA instead of a Master’s or a pHD. This was for one simple reason, people who majored in the sciences/engineering typically have relatively no idea on people management or how a business work and I wanted those skills as well.
That being said, I still love science and I am happy that I have a degree in it, but I wouldn’t suggest it to kids getting degrees out there. It really can limit your upward mobility.
Also, I have met lots of pHD’s that I wonder how the hell they got their degree in the first place. They seem to be devoid of practical knowledge and common sense.
I think that may be true of non-science academic PhD's, and possibly some academic science PhD's. Most of the science and "working for businesses" PhD's I know are conservative.
The military and NASA cuts aren’t helping.
You have to distinguish between academic PhDs and private-industry PhDs. The PhD who depends on government grant money is naturally going to favor the expansion of government, because a bigger government will have more money to spend on an increasingly large number of topics.
The article was typical liberal SOP take one case where there is a science jobs problem then extrapolate it to all science career tracks.
The government empowers the credentialed over the competent. Naturally, the credentialed favor expansion of the power of government. The Democrats are the party of government. Therefore, most PhDs favor the Democrats, who recognize their “brilliance” and reward it proportionately. Same mootchal backscratching as between government unions and Democrats.
True.
Just another of the many methods Obama is utilizing to destroy the United States. That’s what this is really about.
Perhaps of a certain age. Try being told by a headhunter their client is "looking for someone younger" and not even being retirement age.
There are technical fields in government military labs and warfare centers that are desperately short of engineers and/or PhDs, even with the cuts - where entire divisions have nobody under the age of 60. The problem is that they now have a smattering of 25 year old fresh out of college types, but then there is a huge hole in the middle. The Navy actually hired a lot of people out of the auto industry to try to fill that.
Going into defense has been “uncool” for quite a while (if you wanted to get laid, you tell girls you’re going to work for Solyndra, not the Naval Research Lab or Lockheed Martin), and there was a long period of time where Wall Street was siphoning off science and engineering talent for people to be “quants.”
...as we spend $40+ Billion on food stamps, things like basic research simply get crowded out.
...but, of course, people won’t figure that out.
So true. I’ve worked far a large biopharma company for 8 years and we’ve had several layoffs. The low hanging fruit of drug development are gone now so here we are.
One thing no one has mentioned is immigration. About one half of the scientists I work with come from other countries. Do we need to import scientists in this field?
“Yes. Phd is way overrated.”
The wife wouldn’t agree with you, but the kids are cheering for you!!
I believe law firms hire and send scientists and engineers to law school to help beef up their in-house knowledge and court expertise.
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