No PhDs Please: This is Canada: Dismal Employment and Earning Prospects of PhDs in an

ISBN-13: 9781479317950 / Angielski / Miękka / 2012 / 58 str.

Mahmood Iqbal Phd

Opis

This book examines the value of a PhD in Canada from a broad perspective and is written in a format suitable for a wide audience: professionals, business executives, governments and policy makers. It is presented through self-explanatory charts. The book dispels the conventional wisdom that the highest possible education is always rewarded. Earnings of PhDs in Canada are very close to those with a Masters; their unemployment rate is even higher, quite opposite of their counterparts in the United States and OECD countries. A government report shows that a good number of them are driving taxies. There are three main reasons for the deplorable state of Canada's PhDs: declining academic positions due to continued budget cuts (universities being the main employer), antipathy of politicians who are decision makers in governments (the second major employer) toward facts and research, and the continuing risk-averse, traditional outlook of the Canadian business sector. Canada's private sector is at the bottom among competing OECD countries when it comes to R&D activities. It hires only 4% PhDs compared to the 42% hired by the private sector in the United States. Canada's economy is still predominantly resource based, as it was in the last century. About 60% of Canada's manufacturing and 70% of its top ten exports are resource related -- areas of the economy where there is hardly a need for PhDs. Future outlook for PhDs is not expected to be different. It is due to shrinking full time faculty positions, aversion of political masters towards science and research and mindset of private sector to be content with the continued traditional primary and resource based economic activities.