Shortage of Scientists and Engineers

Based on a recent article in the New York Times, Japan is facing a shortage in engineers and scientists. Well, welcome to the club! Based on reports over the past few years, the US has been facing such a shortage for the last 20 years, or so. Although undergraduate enrollment in the science and engineering fields increased slightly between 2000 and 2003, overall such enrollment has been sliding down since the 1980s.

Who's to blame, you ask. Well, there is apparently plenty of blame to go around, it just depends on who you ask. The most often cited reason you hear is, "...of course, in today's lazy society it's easier to get a degree in social studies, rather than go into science and engineering which requires a lot of work and commitment". That's an easy answer, it sounds good, only it attempts to simplify the problem way too much. We wish that answers to such serious socio-economical issues were that simple - they are not.

Although a general laziness, impatience, and need for immediate results, of newer generations is likely *a* reason, it seems to me that there are many factors that have contributed to bringing us to where we are today.

One of the factors was the general thinking, a few decades ago, that college students needed to graduate with a more balanced education. The belief was that graduates of science and engineering were not taking enough "social studies" courses and were not in touch reality, and the social issues that surrounded them. This necessitated the increased funding and enforcement of social studies departments, which in turn resulted in higher student requitments by those departments, which now needed additional funding to function properly, which started a self-sustained exponential growth cycle for such departments and their influence on colleges and universities in general.

Another factor was that many engineers and scientists spent 4,6 or more years of very demanding university work, to get a job, making a descent salary, working for a business manager with the same level of education making 4 or 5 times as much. Save for the satisfaction of one doing what one likes, very disheartening!

Also, in the 70's, who hadn't heard the stories about young people with PhD degrees from Harvard, driving cabs because they couldn't get a job?

These are some of the reasons that there may be a shortage. On the other hand, part of the announced shortages could be well orchestrated propaganda, to lower the criteria for allowing scientists and engineers to immigrate to this country.

But, I'm sure you had already thought of that, as well...