Too Many Scientists

Here’s another field to add to the growing list of sectors where there aren’t enough jobs for people who are qualified to do them: Scientists. If you want to work in a lab, the job market is pretty tight right now.

Scientific American hinted at this in 2010 around the time when everyone was arguing that the U.S. education system lagged behind a lot of other countries when it came to science and engineering. In 2008, Bill Gates testified in front of Congress that, “We face a critical shortfall of skilled scientists and engineers who can develop new breakthrough technologies.” There might not be a scientist shortfall, but to be fair to Gates, he also argued that there should be an increase in federal funding for scientific research because that money would go to create jobs for a new generation of scientists and researchers who would ensure that the U.S. would remain innovative and globally competitive.

It’s a little sad, because we do want the kids who dream about growing up and curing cancer to go ahead and pursue their ambitions, otherwise they might change their minds and use their brainpower to build us another social app that gives us discounts to something if we check in and pin our locations, and do we really want that?

Thanks Jon C. for the tip! Photo: Shutterstock/Zholobov Vadim

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