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[dismalist]

OP, there is never oversupply; there are only different prices. Everything looks OK to me, in that it's all voluntary.

[jonesey]

I thought the English prof was a dream job; I left a well-paying corporate job to take a FT position (and a rather embarrassing pay cut).  Why did I do it?  Simple: my two years of grad school (MFA) were damn near the best two years of my life.  I saw professors going to the bar and drinking with students just about every night, talking about literature, teaching class from 10am to about noon and I thought "This has to be the greatest job ever!"  So, I finished, and applied, and got a job at a small, private college no one's ever heard of teaching Comp I and Developmental English and some Literature as well.  4/4 load.  Etc, etc. 

Now, I really do like my job, but I'm not drinking with students and working two hours a day, etc.  I, of course, had no idea what went on behind the scenes with my professors in grad school.  Plus, they taught grad school.  My Comp I profs didn't seem like they loved it when I went through my BA program, but I'd, of course, totally forgotten that by the time I was getting my Masters. 

My friend is thinking of dropping his (well-paying) corporate job, at age 40, go get a PhD in...History.  Why?  Because he loves history, of course.  : ) 

I've tried to tell him the truth, but he says he'll be happy "doing what he loves" even if he makes $40k/year less.  I try to tell him that he might not even get a job, but, of course, he knows that won't happen to him.  Heck, he's even willing to teach at a CC (I said similar things, because, like may, I thought my worst case scenario was a TT job at a CC.  Ha!  I'd kill for a TT job at a CC!). 

Some people make the mistake of thinking that, because they love literature, or Roman history, or art, that they'll love teaching it.  Big difference. 

[carebearstare]

What strikes me in the many good explanations in this thread so far is that there seem to be a confluence of factors, some individual/psychological, some social/institutional, some economic, some purely disciplinary. That so many people want to enter these fields is a testament to their lasting attraction, but it also signifies what seem like some deep-rooted problems in academe more generally--problems that are not insurmountable for everyone, but which are a pretty tough go for many, and which are maybe not adequately articulated (or believed) by most.

So the next question is, what can be done? This is not to say people should be able to study whatever they damn well please, nor to say any solutions that might be offered would actually be able to be played out. But I'm wondering if folks could wave a magic wand and fix a few things, what would those things be?

[aneumey]

When I was hired as a temp full time, I took a "permanent" job I knew I would hate at a neighboring institution in order to be a stronger candidate when a TT position emerged.  My strategy succeeded, and I was hired back to my original institution.  Since then, I have discovered that there were 450 applications for the position, even though it wa only advertised for a month. Our school does have a reputation for being a great place to work, so that is a factor.  Still, it doesn't explain 450 applications for one TT assistant professor position.

That made me reflect.  Beyond job performance, what helped me to land jobs?  The answer I came up with is versatility.  My grad professors in both of my graduate programs constantly stressed the importance of specialization.  Now, if you want to primarily be a researcher and teach grad students, that is fine.  But most students in both my programs wanted to teach for SLACS and CCs (I was one of the latter).  If that is one's goal, then being able to teach a broad range of classes is an invaluable asset.  Overspecialization limits a person to just a handful of university positions. 

I was surprised to discover that of those 450 applicants, ~40 percent had a doctorate, I don't.  However, in every case, the Ph.D. was only qualified to teach one or at most two of the courses we offer.  By contrast, I can potentially teach in three departments, although in practice I teach in a very focused area (my area of primary interest lies on the boarder between several departments, but I possess the degrees and course hours to teach in each department).  My point is that either due to a lack of understanding of the job market or a tunnnel vision focus on creating researchers and grad professors, part of the problem in the humanities is the fact that graduates are being encouraged to specialize in order to get a job when this actually hurts their prospects unless the want to teach grad school

[samspade]

When I was an undergad I majored in history because frankly I thought it was an easy degree. I had always loved it but never thought of doing it for a living. After working in the business world, I was bored stiff and went and got an MA and rediscovered my love of the subject. Much to the dismay of my then-wife, I decided to pursue the PhD even though I knew the long odds. I do now have a visiting job, and I will be back on the market again this year, but all in all, I am glad I made this career choice. Dr. Dre raised a good point of low -end programs. I did not graduate from an Ivy but from a public southern school and believe that has hurt me on the market. I can't imagine how tough it must be if you graduated from a lower tier program. I would be happier with fewer graduates in history. It might help me land a TT job.

[octoprof]

Great question. The obvious answer is overproduction--grad programs turning out too many PhDs for too few positions. But why does this happen in history and not (to my knowledge) physics?

Two other factors are that 1) the private industry options for a PhD in the humanities are not as obvious as they are in other fields, and 2) the oversupply of applicants is a characteristic of a lot of dream jobs--playing in the NFL, serving in the US Senate, being a full-time Park Ranger at Yellowstone.

I don't buy #1, since that is also true in my undersupplied field (i.e. no obvious private industry options for a PhD in accounting).

[hollow_man]

This thread gave me the impetus to track down a story that a professor mentioned to me a while back:

According to Money magazine, being a college professor is the second-best job you can have:
http://money.cnn.com/magazines/moneymag/bestjobs/2006/top50/index.html

[galactic_hedgehog]

This thread gave me the impetus to track down a story that a professor mentioned to me a while back:

According to Money magazine, being a college professor is the second-best job you can have:
http://money.cnn.com/magazines/moneymag/bestjobs/2006/top50/index.html

From their article How we picked the best jobs

Using Salary.com compensation data, we eliminated jobs with average pay below $50,000;

So their "college professor" is really a professor, I guess, and not an asst. prof.

[polly_mer]

This thread gave me the impetus to track down a story that a professor mentioned to me a while back:

According to Money magazine, being a college professor is the second-best job you can have:
http://money.cnn.com/magazines/moneymag/bestjobs/2006/top50/index.html

From their article How we picked the best jobs

Using Salary.com compensation data, we eliminated jobs with average pay below $50,000;

So their "college professor" is really a professor, I guess, and not an asst. prof.

Or they are averaging in everyone including medical and law school.  Several years ago, my mother sent me an article from the local newspaper, which had the interesting statistic that average pay for a faculty member at Big State U was $50,000.  Her comment was "Look how much money they make for only 9 hours of work a week.  No wonder you want to do that."

[hollow_man]

My sample size is admittedly small (it's my peer group), but it is large to say that it is not rare for an assistant prof in the humanities to start above $50,000.  N=5, and four of us started over 50K.  This included various types of schools, not all in high-COL areas.

What would kill our program's average salary (if anyone computed it) is the other people who, for various reasons, have not gotten tenure-track jobs.  So in my mind, a doctoral program may be a sketchy proposition, but a professorship is a good job.

[doctor_torrseal]

Great question. The obvious answer is overproduction--grad programs turning out too many PhDs for too few positions. But why does this happen in history and not (to my knowledge) physics?

Two other factors are that 1) the private industry options for a PhD in the humanities are not as obvious as they are in other fields, and 2) the oversupply of applicants is a characteristic of a lot of dream jobs--playing in the NFL, serving in the US Senate, being a full-time Park Ranger at Yellowstone.

Talk to a knowledgeable physics prof.  There are about eight jillion NAS studies of the oversupply of physics PhDs - these studies usually follow by several years a study that predicts dire consequences of an impending shortage of scientists, which has never actually come to pass.  If you talked to the grad students in a large physics department during periods of stagnation or shortfall in the field (most of the time, now), you would hear the same anxieties you hear in a humanities department.

There are a few differences - (1) new PhDs try to get postdocs rather than being thrown into the TT-market grinder right away, so they take a few years before not getting a stereotypical TT job; (2) the number of people is smaller because there are fewer physics profs and students than English profs and students; (3) people who leave the field often go into industry, finance, software, or biotech.  These may seem more glamorous or just lucrative than going into teaching, writing, and editing jobs that humanities PhDs often take.  (Humanities PhDs don't starve.  Leaving the field is not equivalent to dying, even though academics treat it that way.)  But the physics PhDs leaving the field still reflect an oversupply.

I will argue that the oversupply of physics PhDs was a long term deliberate Cold War funding strategy, needed to keep a pipeline of trained people flowing into the government defense labs, and secondarily the tech industry.  It still exists because that's the way things have been done and it is useful for quite a few powerful interests, although it may not seem so nice to those seeking a job.

[carebearstare]

What interests me about the last reply, doctor_torrseal, is this:

There are a few differences - (1) new PhDs try to get postdocs rather than being thrown into the TT-market grinder right away, so they take a few years before not getting a stereotypical TT job; (2) the number of people is smaller because there are fewer physics profs and students than English profs and students; (3) people who leave the field often go into industry, finance, software, or biotech.  These may seem more glamorous or just lucrative than going into teaching, writing, and editing jobs that humanities PhDs often take.  (Humanities PhDs don't starve.  Leaving the field is not equivalent to dying, even though academics treat it that way.)  But the physics PhDs leaving the field still reflect an oversupply.

So is it simply that English and the like tend to be requirements, thus drawing more undergraduates in and progressing that way up into grad school and the job market? And if physics were more of a requirement, there would also subsequently be more majors, more grad students, and more people seeking jobs? I don't dismiss the assertion that many fields are "oversupplied,"--after all, that's a relative term which basically means more people applying for jobs and spots in programs than will ever be admitted. But the anecdote upthread about 450 applications for one job is shocking. Take away the lawyers, un-degreed high school teachers, and the like who always apply for college teaching jobs because they think it would be "a nice change," we're still talking far bigger numbers for relatively fewer jobs. I think physics was also more of a random choice, which is just to say that some areas of the sciences, or fields like marketing, might have an easier go of it than English or history.

Additionally, I don't think anyone is saying an English PhD with no academic job prospects is going to starve. But editing and writing jobs are also pretty hard to come by, and often require moving to pretty expensive cities. A PhD turned editor is still going to make much less than a physicist (or accountant, or marketer) who goes to work for industry.

[dr_dre]

I think Accounting and Business fields don't fit the discussion parameters so neatly, since they are more professional degrees. Mrs. Dre is an Accountant. With some skill and a BA or an MBA or an MA in Accounting, one can earn easily 50-100+K, wear suits every day and be treated with respect.

As Larryc notes, with an MA in the Humanities, I was working as a secretary, then as a researcher for 23K and no health benefits. I felt then that if I wanted a good job in the field, I needed to get the Ph.D. and fight my way to a TT position. It was a different career progression entirely.

Mrs. Dre would never do a Ph.D. in Accounting because doing so would not substantially improve her life. Her relationship with the field is also different. On weekends and evenings, she doesn't want to go to Barnes and Noble to see the new Accounting books, or read book reviews in her field. In fact, outside a few training binders, she doesn't have any work-related books or articles. I think there are many people like her in Accounting and Business fields. She likes her job, and the respect and money it brings her, but the job itself is not a driving passion in her life.

My job is not a driving passion in my life, either, but my love of the field is. I will do more research and reading and publishing than my teaching job requires or expects, because it is also my hobby and it brings me pleasure.

[octoprof]

I think Accounting and Business fields don't fit the discussion parameters so neatly, since they are more professional degrees. Mrs. Dre is an Accountant. With some skill and a BA or an MBA or an MA in Accounting, one can earn easily 50-100+K, wear suits every day and be treated with respect.


Mrs. Dre would never do a Ph.D. in Accounting because doing so would not substantially improve her life. Her relationship with the field is also different. On weekends and evenings, she doesn't want to go to Barnes and Noble to see the new Accounting books, or read book reviews in her field. In fact, outside a few training binders, she doesn't have any work-related books or articles. I think there are many people like her in Accounting and Business fields. She likes her job, and the respect and money it brings her, but the job itself is not a driving passion in her life.

Thus, we have a concise explanation of why PhDs in Accounting are in short supply. Mrs. Dre is normal!  Most normal accountants just aren't interested in pursuing a PhD.  Mostly, they have no incentive.  If they like what they are doing now, the PhD would be a hindrance, in fact.

[grasshopper]

The idea of being a history of English prof as a kind of "dream job" is interesting to me. Where does that belief come from? And does it follow that it's got something to do with a poverty of imagination--that is, people (sometimes? often?) go into the humanities because they don't know what else they could or should study, but only that they simply like to study?

I think they go into it because they love studying it. At the PhD level, anyway. I do see quite a few Masters students who have gone on from the BA because they don't know what else to do with their undergrad degree in Philosophy or Religion or Anthro or English. For the most part, though, these students quickly realize their mistake, and cut out before the PhD.

Loving it and being good at it are two different things. Are are being good at it and wanting to do it full-time for the rest of your life.


I think, too, that the idea of being A Professor, especially a thoughtful, philosophical humanities professor, is romanticized throughout our culture. And as Jonesey mentioned up-thread,  there's no idea what goes on behind the curtain. All students see is what goes on at the front of the classroom. I had absolutely no idea what I was getting into when I entered a Masters program. No clue. All I knew was that I loved the subject matter and loved the romantic idea I had of what it meant to be a professor. 

Now, of course, I'm finishing up, hitting the job market, and scared s***less. heh. Turns out that there's A LOT that goes on behind the curtain.

And, yes, by the time they get to graduate school, most humanities students are used to being large-ish fish in comparatively smaller ponds.  They don't think for a moment they'll have problems on the job market.

That was me. What a downer to realize that I wasn't as smart as I thought I was.

This was my experience in grad school!  *Many* of my classmates did not know how to perform a basic literature review or use proper citations for term papers.  We, their peers and competitors, often had to tutor them on the side or sit in class while the instructor took a session to teach remedial skills.  Many of these people went on to get lucrative TT and adjunct jobs where some of us who had entered with basic grad-level skills (and acquired an equivalent mastery of the material on the way) were left with their scraps.

It really made me wonder about how well any of us was vetted before entry into the program(s).  Some of them did little more than suck up to the profs, complete the profs' pet projects for them, and then move on with their blessing.  In a way, I guess that's how grad school is supposed to work [at least in the apprenticeship model].

But despite their inabilities to write basic lit reviews, these people clearly had something else.

If the ones who needed help at the beginning ended up doing good work and getting jobs, and the ones who didn't need  help (or maybe didn't think they needed help?) didn't get good jobs... well,  maybe your perception of your abilities relative to theirs underestimated them.

My sample size is admittedly small (it's my peer group), but it is large to say that it is not rare for an assistant prof in the humanities to start above $50,000.  N=5, and four of us started over 50K.  This included various types of schools, not all in high-COL areas.

Most of the humanities TT assistant prof positions I've been applying to have been offering in the range of $40 - $60, 000. As are the humanities postdocs.