Related Story: Shrinking PhD 11/24/1998

PALO ALTO - During the past few years, we have seen many grad students with shiny new PhD parchment come through our doors seeking work as coopy editors and feature writers. A few years ago this phenomenon would have been unthinkable. But, in this Clinton economy the labor maket for Humanities PhDs has all but dried up.

Data sets on grad students who earned their PhD's in two years ago cover the hard sciences, such as physics and chemistry, and the social sciences, such as political science and sociology. For those studied, unemployment rates for those with earned PhD's in 14 different fields of study ranged from less than 1 per cent in psychology to 7 per cent in political science.

The rates in most other fields were 2 to 4 per cent. The most revealing data showed the proportion of scientists in each field with temporary jobs. More than half of the new PhD's in chemistry, physics, earth and space sciences held temporary posts, and more than half of them said they did so involuntarily, because they couldn't find suitable permanent positions.

In the 25-page report, released today by the association's ad hoc Committee on Graduate Education, the association examines a range of criticisms that have been leveled at Ph.D. programs. The report looks at whether universities are producing too many doctorates and training them too narrowly. It also considers whether institutions are failing to give graduate students proper career advice and assistance in finding jobs.

The report says that despite the concern about the job market for new Ph.D.'s, the unemployment rate for holders of doctorates has remained low. In 1995, the 60 American universities that are members of the A.A.U. awarded 22,000 Ph.D.'s -- a little more than half of all the doctorates awarded. Only 2 per cent of people who earned their Ph.D.'s between 1991 and 1994 at the 60 A.A.U. institutions were unemployed in 1995.

Among Ph.D.'s in the humanities only, the rate was higher: 3.3 per cent. By comparison, in 1989, the proportion of all Ph.D.'s who were unemployed after finishing their work at A.A.U. institutions during the four previous years was 1.3 per cent.

What's not known is exactly how the Ph.D.'s are employed and whether they're underemployed and not using their doctoral training. The report urges universities to do a better job of systematically tracking their Ph.D.'s to find out what kinds of jobs they end up in. That information will also help universities figure out which programs to scale back and where to limit admission, the report says.

In January, the Modern Language Association releaed a report which attracted a lot of attention among the 9,000 language and literature professors in attendance, and delegates at the meeting overwhelmingly approved its recommendations for improving the job situation. But some professors and graduate students criticized the effort as too little, too late.

The report said overproduction of Ph.D.'s in English and foreign languages had combined with an increasing reliance on part-time instructors to keep many new Ph.D.'s out of the academic job market altogether. Of the 4,000 graduate students who were expected to earn doctorates in those fields between 1996 and the year 2000 can expect to eventually find full-time, tenure-track positions.

The National Science Foundation, howevwr, discounts the MLA optimism. The NSF told Bulldog Reporters that the actual unemployment rate of PhD's in the sciences, engineering, and humanities is less than 2 per cent. There are other surveys by professional societies that indicate that many PhD's are having difficulty ever finding the jobs they want, particularly if they want tenure-track positions at research universities.

Some academics and policy makers believe that, given the dismal job market, it is immoral and exploitative to encourage students to enter doctoral programs.

Although concern about the academic job market in the arts, humanities, and social sciences has been prevalent for years, public attention rose dramatically ny 1997, when, for the first time since the early 1970s, newly graduated scientists and engineers also began to encounter difficulties finding research-related jobs, in industry as well as academe.

These columns covered this story since it first appeared on the horizon in 1992. The Economics Institute of Washington D.C. reported in the Spring of 1997 that job applicants in higher ed who held earned doctorates were piling up outside universities with academic job openings were finding slim opportunities for interviews. Tenured professors retirements and turnover had been very low.

This past Fall, for the first time, graduate enrollment in fields like physics and engineering, sharply declined.