In a study submitted for publication by two researchers at the University of California, San Francisco, there emerges what seems to be a direct relationship between increases in extramural funding at the National Institutes of Health and numbers of doctorates awarded in the biological sciences. But this reform requires the active involvement of the higher education community, a group that has not provided much public information and analysis on these issues. This reform will also require the candid participation of the scientific and engineering professional societies and focused discussion, such as we see in this publication. And we will need open and painful discussions by leading scientific institutions, involving not only the esteemed Ph.D.s from the 1960's and before, but some people who have recently minted doctorates and are living through the current situation. The time is long past when we can placate taxpayers and parents with reassuring anecdotes about physics Ph.D.s who were lucky enough to get jobs modeling stock prices on Wall Street.
Serendipity is an inadequate public policy, even in times of plenty.
The Federal Government, institutions of higher education, directors of research labs, and scientific societies have all passively conspired to create the current market forces that are producing a dysfunctional situation. We must all work together to change the market forces.