When I was in graduate school, we were being told that there was a shortage of science jobs in the US. There were even commercials on the TV telling kids to go into science (ironically, the only person I remember clearly in one of the commercials was Newt Gingrich, who helped the Republican Congress throttle science in the 1990s).
A friend of mine called that The Big Lie. There were not that many job openings then, and in fact only a few of the grad students with me at that time went on to astronomy careers. A lot of them — incredibly intelligent, good scientists — couldn’t find work. Most now make three times as much money in the computer industry anyway. But still.
Things eased up a bit for a while, but I wonder. There is a story on Fox News (I know, I poured Clorox all over my keyboard after linking there) that astronomy jobs are on the decline again.
I’ll be attending the American Astronomical Society meeting in January, and I’ll have to keep my ears open about this. I haven’t heard much about a declining job market lately, and since that article is from Fox News it’s almost certainly wrong, so I’m curious to know what’s really going on.
October 17th, 2007 at 1:34 pm
To give you an idea of the situation… I graduated in 1988 with a B.S. in Astronomy from a large school. Today, I am working at the same school (in another area) and almost all of the professors I had classes with (6 out of 8 and, or so) are still here teaching / doing research.
Admittedly, there are a lot of new professors in the department because it has grown, and there is a lot of research, but astro and physics profs just never seem to retire…
EA
October 17th, 2007 at 2:09 pm
Well, without further evidence I would not take a story from Faux News seriously.
October 17th, 2007 at 2:48 pm
I’m not in Astronomy, but I have my BS in Chemistry. And unless you have a degree in pharmacutical, there isn’t much out there (and not much for BS degrees). A lot of corporations have severely downsized their R&D departments (or rely on overseas labs if the headquarters are there). I know a lot of Biology majors who are so far removed from anything Biology it’s downright sad. I’m not surprised that Astronomy has gotten hit too. Unfortunately, Science does not equal Opportunity in this country.
October 17th, 2007 at 2:50 pm
So does that mean us computer geeks are going to have to compete with Astro geeks taking our jobs again? Sheeeeesh! jk =)
October 17th, 2007 at 3:05 pm
Wow. Of all the Republicans to accuse of being anti-science, Gingrich is probably the last one you’d want to.
Some Gingrich quotes from a Discover Magazine interview:
“I believe evolution should be taught as science, and intelligent design should be taught as philosophy.”
“I’ve advocated, for example, paying kids in 7th through 12th grade the equivalent of what they would make working at McDonald’s if they take math and science and get a B or better.”
“”We currently pay for rock stars, movie stars, and football and basketball players. Shouldn’t being a child prodigy in math be at least as important as being a child prodigy in basketball?”
What he thinks a President can do to advance science:
“The first thing you do is you talk about it every day.”
“I am against research on aborted fetuses. Having said that, I would not seek to ban research on stem cells in fertility clinics.”
An interesting idea:
“On the other hand, there’s a lot of research now being done on the ability to take, I think, one out of eight cells from the very earliest stages of reproduction without harming the embryo. If that turns out to be viable, you might end up with people having their own cell line almost as a matter of course 20 years from now.”
On GW:
“Unlike right-wingers who would say, ‘Since we don’t know 100 percent for sure, we can keep carbon loading,’ I’d say there is enough evidence that it’s reasonable to try to move toward renewables, to try to move toward conservation, to try to move toward a hydrogen economy.”
“I am a [Theodore] Rooseveltian Republican. I believe in incentives, not punishment. I’d change the market and let the technologies sort themselves out. But I will also say I’d look at soy diesel, at E85 ethanol, solar power, wind power, and better systems of conservation.”
“You have NASA, this huge, graying bureaucracy that sits around wasting money and enforcing timidity. Just look at the length of time between shuttle launches: If the Wright brothers had done that, we wouldn’t be flying today. You have to have a risk-oriented, high-tempo, entrepreneurial model; you ought to offer enormous rewards for lowering the cost of getting into space. You want everybody and their brother to show up and compete.”
Not science, but a good one. On Washington D.C.:
“We are in an enormous mismatch between our governing elite and reality on a bipartisan basis. I’m certain not more than 1 percent of this city has a clue.”
From a U.S. News Article
- As a child, Gingrich dreamed of becoming a paleontologist. He even kept a cast of a Tyrannosaurus Rex skull in his office on Capitol Hill.
October 17th, 2007 at 3:14 pm
Oh, and from NG’s biography:
“Newt Gingrich is a leading advocate of increased Federal funding for basic science research. In 2001, he was the recipient of the Science Coalition’s first Science Pioneer award, given to him for his outstanding contributions to educating the public about science and its benefits to society.”
And he cowrote an alternate Earth novel.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1945_%28novel%29
October 17th, 2007 at 3:18 pm
“since that article is from Fox News it’s almost certainly wrong,”
Nice ad hominem. How can I trust *you* when you let your ideology rage like this? I’m not even a Fox News fan or anything, but that’s just massively hypocritical.
October 17th, 2007 at 3:29 pm
QD: I know that Gingrich is pro-science… when it suits him. When he was in Congress, he was at the forefront of destroying a lot of science oversight in the government, including tearing down the very important Office of Technology Assessment.
Samos, Fox News is well known among the reality-based community as being a shill for the neocons. It’s not an ad hom if it’s true and evidence based. In this case, it’s more of a non-sequitor, since this wasn’t a political issue. Still, whenever I happen to watch Fox news, it never goes more than about a minute without being grossly slanted or factually incorrect.
October 17th, 2007 at 3:42 pm
There’s an interesting article on “freelance” astronomers in the last issue of Nature mag, the NatureJobs section. Seems there are about 200 astronomers in the US making a full time living as such without working for academia, corporations or agencies. They live on soft money, i.e. grants they get for themselves. Heidi Hammel was one name I recognized.
Since the big granting agencies don’t like to grant directly to individuals, the freelancers affiliate with one of a couple grant administering centers, who help with paperwork, invoicing, offer group health insurance for a fee, etc.
Advantages are flexibility, can work mostly at home since most professional astronomy is done at PCs, not telescopes and not tied to one geographic location. Disadvantages include uncertainty of soft money, 10% of time spent in applying for grants, usually no grad students and difficulty accessing specialized equipment.
October 17th, 2007 at 3:53 pm
# Samos3on 17 Oct 2007 at 3:18 pm
“since that article is from Fox News it’s almost certainly wrong,â€
As they say in the ‘hood, “Fool me once,….”
October 17th, 2007 at 4:00 pm
i’m testing the odds and applying for astronomy jobs right now. the good news is that AAS posted a ton of post-doc level job opportunities in october! i’ll be applying for non-academic jobs too, just to see whats out there and what i could get…
see you in austin in january, BA!
October 17th, 2007 at 4:00 pm
I’m just wondering, how broad is the descriptor “Astronomy” here when it comes to job openings? The thing is, I’m currently a grad in “Astrophysics and Cosmology” (studying the structure of dark matter halos in galaxy groups currently), and I’m wondering whether this is something I might need to worry about. Granted, I am currently up in Canada right now at any rate, but I’m open to taking a job in the US after I get my doctorate.
October 17th, 2007 at 4:10 pm
That lack of jobs is why I didn’t go on to get the Fudd in Astrophyics… I may go back and get it anyway,since I’m a sponge for knowledge, but at the time, I needed a job more than I needed the knowledge. (Sad but true.)
Anyway, it’s sad that the U.S. politicians (particularly of the right-wing persuasion) are trashing science; they trash the future as they do so.
October 17th, 2007 at 4:52 pm
There’s always jobs in education – EPO (Education and Public Outreach) appeared to be up-and-coming when I was job searching 4 years ago, and the need for grades 6-12 science teachers will never wane. I ended up at a Community College myself, which’s good because I enjoy teaching, but I like being able to include more content than I could at the high school level.
October 17th, 2007 at 5:02 pm
Oh, I don’t claim that Gingrich is faultless. Who the heck is?
And, to be honest, there is some basis for argument that the OTA was a redundancy, but let’s let that dead dog lie.
I still maintain Gingrich is solidly pro-science at the end of the day, and especially since he is more in the private sector now, albeit an advocate for various pubic plicy things. In the Republican sphere, he’s the antithesis of GW Bush.
There’s just a million better anti-science targets.
October 17th, 2007 at 6:08 pm
It’s not just science…. I’m a history grad student, and the market for academic historians (in America, anyway) is horrible. When I was visiting my university during the application process, I was told by the acting chair that even if I worked hard and got my doctorate at a good university, it didn’t automatically guarantee me a position in academia.
October 17th, 2007 at 6:09 pm
Gingrich has annoyed me in the past (mostly with war on drugs rhetoric) but he actually would have been much better than W. He is a true student of history and has a certain amount of depth that is rare in politicians and especially Republicans. As for the issue of jobs in pure science; I suppose it is no surprise that most companies don’t have an astronomy department. It is beyond the scope of most businesses (Maybe Celestron has a few Ph.D.s?). As for the University system, someone above pointed out that retiring professors are rare, I’m sure that is true. You can be a crusty 90 year old and still handle the job, in fact unless your passion for the subject wanes (unlikely) why would you retire? As for Phil the Bad Astronomer, look how he ended up self employed. I suppose anyone with a knack for it could become a media type celebrity ala Carl Sagan or Neil DeGrasse Tyson, once again mostly have to pull oneself up by their own astronomy bootstraps.
Just one more aside: In the quest for pure science, I think government should certainly patronize pure science and scientists, but more important possibly is government’s investment in new hardware. More hardware means more jobs to fill, and of course more discoveries.
October 17th, 2007 at 6:58 pm
Gingrich just finished coauthoring a book called “A Contact With The Earth”, which calls for action to combat global warming.
October 17th, 2007 at 7:10 pm
Here is a review of[url=http://www.fredbortz.com/review/ContractWithEarth.htm]A Contract With The Earth[/url].
October 17th, 2007 at 9:20 pm
I’ve noticed that “shortage of science jobs” doesn’t necessarily mean science jobs. That phrase, when it gets any elaboration in the news, often is used to include engineers and anything technical, probably including computers… the sorts of jobs that you can’t get with a PhD because you’re overqualified, and that pay $40,000 a year if you’re lucky.
October 18th, 2007 at 2:10 am
I have a faculty position in astrophysics at a leading university (not US).
Part of the problem is that people don’t know what they need to do to apply for jobs – they don’t know what they need on their cv to get a position. Papers and grants are very important, and students should be writing papers and applying for grants (i.e. travel etc) as soon as possible. Also, grant success leads to more grant success. There is no point until waiting until the year before your tenure is coming up and thinking “I’d better apply for one of those grant things now then”.
I know some people will squawk at the above, and complain about how research success is judged, but when 50 cvs land on your desk and you have to rank them, bare metrics are usually the starting point. The thing that spooks me is the number of people with few papers etc who are surprised that their inner brilliance is not apparent in their cv.
So – all in all, I suggest that understanding the astronomy career path and how to get a job should be as part of the PhD as sloping off when ever your supervisor is out of town.
October 18th, 2007 at 8:28 am
I’m all for astronomy research and all, but really, is there anything that would make you think that the work force is in constant demand for astronomers?
“it never goes more than about a minute without being grossly slanted or factually incorrect” – a bit of an exaggeration, but I’ll take it. As long as you also let me use it in this case; find me one news channel that you can’t apply that statement to and I’ll give you some land in Florida.
October 18th, 2007 at 8:51 am
we were being told that there was a shortage of science jobs in the US. There were even commercials on the TV telling kids to go into science
I’m confused. Why would they exhort kids to go into a field that already has an inadequate number of jobs? That would just result in more people unable to work in their field.
October 18th, 2007 at 9:29 am
The mistake was in thinking that you should study science in order to become an academic scientist. There are never going to be as many of those jobs as there are people who yearn for that type of career. It was always my understanding that the rhetorical science push was intended to encourage students to gain the types of skills necessary to become effective professional engineers of some sort (including software engineer). (In addition to just inculcating an understanding of how the world works.)
October 18th, 2007 at 10:27 am
@ BA
“When I was in graduate school, we were being told that there was a shortage of science jobs in the US. There were even commercials on the TV telling kids to go into science….”
So there’s a job shortage but the Gov’t wants to train ppl up for the non-existing jobs.
I agree with your friend, that does seem like a Big Lie since the statements are at odds with each other someone must have been lying (either your Grad School or the Gov’t).
October 18th, 2007 at 11:20 am
Err – not all scientists are academics, and most are not astronomers. What’s needed are “applied scientists” – those that make things and do things that make money, save lives, make lives better. There are science jobs *in industry*.
The world is OK with the number of astronomers and string theorists that it already has…..
October 18th, 2007 at 3:50 pm
Nate beat me to my main point, but I can still add something:
We science teachers are now being told that there will be an extreme shortage of American citizens who can take the science jobs (read “technically oriented jobs”) with DOD and the military, since they want “real Americans” to avoid security risks. (Something that didn’t seem to slow down the Manhattan project…)
October 18th, 2007 at 6:07 pm
Before you go to college, you go to high school (unless you’re a prodigy as is the BA). And before you go to high school, well,….you know. And to have science at any level you have to have teachers, and there is indeed an incredible shortage, at least here in the South. I know. My wife is from the Philippines, and we now have close to fifty Filipinos here in our county who were recruited solely to teach math and science. Since they have an incredible time handling our juvenile delinquents….students….they often quit within a month and go home, and the openings remain unfilled. I’m retired, with a degree in English, but when they saw that I had almost 30 hours of science the local school system urged me to apply to teach science. But, I’m afraid I would slap the crap out of one of these totally wild kids and that would be the end of me. One of the kids spat in the face of one of the Filipino teachers two weeks ago and no discipline was imposed, to give you some idea of how bad it is. And an assistant principal and two coaches were attacked by three boys last week. So, if you can “lower” your sights to teach other than in college, there is plenty of need, but I wouldn’t do it unless I were big, with a deep voice and ready to intimidate the worst of these monsters our schools are turning out. America….how I loved you, once.
October 18th, 2007 at 7:49 pm
When I began studying for an M.S. with a goal to teach at the community college level, the instuctor said there was a big demand. By the time I obtained my degree in 1989, the jobs dried up. My understanding is that many scientists, many with Ph.D’s, were now out of work and were moving to the community colleges to teach. I was unable to find a full-time job in a three-state area and wound up teaching part-time. When a full-time position at that college came open, they brought in someone with a Ph.D. I had to settle for work totally unrelated to my degrees.
Many times I’ve felt I’d have been better off if I never had a dream of a career in science. I originally went to college with the intent to become an astronomer. I was so ignorant of what it took to be a scientist despite my strong math and science scores through high school that I struggled to find a path involving a career in science and never did.
I don’t want to discourage anyone from a career in science. Be sure you really know what you are getting into. Today, information is far more readily available than when I was in high school.
October 18th, 2007 at 11:01 pm
I can tell you from my perspective as post-doc/research fellow, the job market is bad, the worst I’ve seen in six years of being out there. Last year, I knew a number of good scientists who got no offers at all. The number of soft-money scientists is soaring. And this year looks even worse. I’m not the only one who may be out of the profession by next year.
PS – I’m not sure how Republicans are throttling science. Overall science funding has increased 50% in the last six years. It flattened a bit in the late 90′s.
October 18th, 2007 at 11:03 pm
PS – The dirty little secret is that Astronomy in particular has been producing way more Ph.Ds than there are permanent jobs for some time. And they know it. It’s a way to get cheap labor.
October 19th, 2007 at 1:43 am
>>PS – The dirty little secret is that Astronomy in particular has been producing way more Ph.Ds than there are permanent jobs for some time. And they know it. It’s a way to get cheap labor.
** ONLY ** if you think all you can do with an astronomy phd is become an astronomer. Quite a few people do astronomy phd cos they like it, but don’t want a career in it. Several of my phd peers went off into banking, with the employer impressed with their maths skills (usually lacking in finance graduates).
October 19th, 2007 at 8:16 am
I’m on my second postdoc, and I thought the job market last year was pretty good, quite a bit better than the previous couple of years.
That said, there are of course fewer astronomy tenure-track faculty jobs than there are people who are qualified to fill them. I’m not sure that’s a horrible thing – people with astronomy PhDs are extremely good at quite a variety of non-astronomy jobs (I used to work for a computer company that by far preferred to hire former astronomers and physicists over people with computing degrees) that are better off for being staffed by astronomers. Also, I take issue with the idea that there are no other permanent astronomy positions – a good fraction of the people I did my PhD with are in permanent staff scientist positions now.
Of course, when I can’t find a job after my current postdoc, I’ll probably be singing a different tune.
[TMB]