Friday, November 25, 2005
The strange supposed shortage of scientists and engineers
Engineering a shortage
Jan 6th 2005
From The Economist
POLITICIANS and businessmen are worried by Britain's shortage of scientists. Industry regularly bemoans the dearth of technically minded employees. Science was a big theme in the chancellor's pre-budget report last month. And it is a favourite subject for Lord Sainsbury, the minister responsible.
But the market demurs. According to a report from UK GRAD, a government-funded group, science and engineering graduates have the highest rate of unemployment, at every level from first degree (see chart) to PhD. And although, when they do find work, their salaries are slightly higher than average, they are rising more slowly than most. The average Briton got a 3.2% wage hike last year, but scientists and engineers had to make do with 2.4%. “It's very difficult to show that there's a shortage from the data,” says Nick Jagger of the Institute for Employment Studies.
What's going on? For engineers, the problem is too much learning. Graduates are plentiful; it is technicians that are in short supply. “We need about 10,000 apprentices a year, but we're only getting 6,000,” says a spokesman for the Engineering Employers' Federation. Pay data backs this up: according to the Engineering Technology Board, salaries for technicians have risen by 15.2% since 2000, compared with 9.5% for chartered engineers.
But the government's determination to push more teenagers through university means that youngsters that might otherwise have left school at 16 and got a vocational qualification are being persuaded to study for degrees instead. Universities are encouraged to offer less rigorous courses, because they are paid according to the number of students they attract and keep.
The result is not too few good-quality graduates but too many poorly-trained ones. Financial services firms in the City offer big salaries to the brightest, which suggests that Britain has more need of good-quality accountants and derivatives traders than engineering graduates. The large engineering groups cherry-pick the best of the rest, leaving a rump of mediocre, expensively-educated graduates who often end up in jobs that technicians could do just as well.
Scientists' problems are different: rather than too much learning, many of them have the wrong sort. Richard Smith of the Science, Engineering and Manufacturing Technologies Alliance, an employers' organisation, complains that there are too many graduates with degrees in subjects that are popular with students but not with employers. Forensic science is one example. Police dramas have made it a popular undergraduate degree, meaning that universities increasingly offer it at the expense of more rigorous courses like chemistry. There were no forensic science courses offered in Britain in 1990; now there are more than 50. The result is a glut: Mr Smith reckons that there are about 2,000 forensic science students graduating every year, but only 100 jobs for them to fill—and these usually require a post-graduate qualification, not just a first degree.
Government policy plays a part here, too: chemistry and physics are expensive to teach compared with watered-down degrees like forensic science, and the universities get the same amount of money either way. But universities will make money only if they offer courses that are popular with students, who seem content to ignore what the market is telling them. That may be the result of state-funded higher education. If students had to pay the full cost of their courses, then employment prospects might loom larger in their minds when deciding what to study.
Jan 6th 2005
From The Economist
POLITICIANS and businessmen are worried by Britain's shortage of scientists. Industry regularly bemoans the dearth of technically minded employees. Science was a big theme in the chancellor's pre-budget report last month. And it is a favourite subject for Lord Sainsbury, the minister responsible.
But the market demurs. According to a report from UK GRAD, a government-funded group, science and engineering graduates have the highest rate of unemployment, at every level from first degree (see chart) to PhD. And although, when they do find work, their salaries are slightly higher than average, they are rising more slowly than most. The average Briton got a 3.2% wage hike last year, but scientists and engineers had to make do with 2.4%. “It's very difficult to show that there's a shortage from the data,” says Nick Jagger of the Institute for Employment Studies.
What's going on? For engineers, the problem is too much learning. Graduates are plentiful; it is technicians that are in short supply. “We need about 10,000 apprentices a year, but we're only getting 6,000,” says a spokesman for the Engineering Employers' Federation. Pay data backs this up: according to the Engineering Technology Board, salaries for technicians have risen by 15.2% since 2000, compared with 9.5% for chartered engineers.
But the government's determination to push more teenagers through university means that youngsters that might otherwise have left school at 16 and got a vocational qualification are being persuaded to study for degrees instead. Universities are encouraged to offer less rigorous courses, because they are paid according to the number of students they attract and keep.
The result is not too few good-quality graduates but too many poorly-trained ones. Financial services firms in the City offer big salaries to the brightest, which suggests that Britain has more need of good-quality accountants and derivatives traders than engineering graduates. The large engineering groups cherry-pick the best of the rest, leaving a rump of mediocre, expensively-educated graduates who often end up in jobs that technicians could do just as well.
Scientists' problems are different: rather than too much learning, many of them have the wrong sort. Richard Smith of the Science, Engineering and Manufacturing Technologies Alliance, an employers' organisation, complains that there are too many graduates with degrees in subjects that are popular with students but not with employers. Forensic science is one example. Police dramas have made it a popular undergraduate degree, meaning that universities increasingly offer it at the expense of more rigorous courses like chemistry. There were no forensic science courses offered in Britain in 1990; now there are more than 50. The result is a glut: Mr Smith reckons that there are about 2,000 forensic science students graduating every year, but only 100 jobs for them to fill—and these usually require a post-graduate qualification, not just a first degree.
Government policy plays a part here, too: chemistry and physics are expensive to teach compared with watered-down degrees like forensic science, and the universities get the same amount of money either way. But universities will make money only if they offer courses that are popular with students, who seem content to ignore what the market is telling them. That may be the result of state-funded higher education. If students had to pay the full cost of their courses, then employment prospects might loom larger in their minds when deciding what to study.
# posted by reckoner @ 1:29 PM 
