PhDs Lack Skills for Surviving Outside Academia

Inefficiency arises from the fact that substantial resources have been invested in training these scientists and engineers. The trained have foregone other careers – and the salary that they would have earned – along the way. The public has invested resources in tuition and stipends. If these ‘investments’ are then forced to enter careers that require less training, resources have not been efficiently deployed. Surely there are less expensive ways to train high school science teachers than to...

 People Don't Need Advanced Degrees

Forty-five percent of people who go to college, four year colleges, don't get a bachelors degree within six years. Those people often have met with disappointment and their investment isn't particularly good, necessarily. Another group of people graduate from college and then have trouble getting jobs and end up taking jobs for which a college education is not really a prerequisite. Twelve percent of the male carriers in the United States today have college degrees. And I have nothing against...

 The NDEA had Broad Benefits, but Unquantifiable Benefits

The four NDEA Titles featured in this report contributed to general upward trends (e.g., in the rate of high school, college, and graduate completion; in the level of student preparedness in science, mathematics, and modern languages; in the number of teachers and degree-granting institutions; in the number of bachelors and doctoral degrees awarded; and in the number of scholarly publications by doctoral recipients) during the years that they were in force. Their provisions also contributed t...

 An Imaginary Diploma

The Johns Hopkins University certifies that John Wentworth Doe does not know anything but Biochemistry. Please pay no attention to any pronouncements he may make on any other subject, particularly when he joins with others of his kind to save the world from something or other. However, he worked hard for this degree and is potentially a most valuable citizen. Please treat him kindly.