Career Dynamics in the Science and Engineering Workforce

University Of California-Santa Barbara, Santa Barbara CA

Investigators

Abstract

This project analyzes more than three decades of data on U.S. scientists and engineers to examine the career dynamics of Ph.D. scientists and engineers. Intellectual Merit: The current textbook explanation for gender differences in labor market outcomes among older workers, including (if not especially) scientists, is that women tend to fall behind men as they choose a less career-oriented work-family balance or as the effects of discrimination in promotion accumulate over the course of a career. Recent work finds the opposite to be the case when individual workers (or scientists) are followed over time. Women tend to earn less than men from a very young age, but tend to be on a similar, or even faster, growth path than men. The low average earnings of older women are predicted by their low earnings at labor market entry. The research examines whether Ph.D. scientists and engineers (either as a whole, or within subsets defined by field of study) tend to follow patterns similar to the highest-paid scientists at the bachelor's or master's degree level, as opposed to the overall patterns observed within samples of somewhat less educated workers, or whether new patterns of career dynamics are yet to be discovered. This study leads to new knowledge about the dynamics of career progress, the role of working long hours, and how these processes vary by gender and race. Broader Impacts: Benjamin Franklin made tremendous contributions to science and technology without devoting his entire life to science. Today, many scientists work long hours per week in an environment of intense competition. If particularly talented individuals with the potential to make enormous contributions to science are either discouraged from becoming scientists, or train to become scientists but do not receive the support that will allow them to do their best work, an opportunity is lost to all. Indeed, the 1981 Congress requested a periodic evaluation of the status of women and underrepresented minorities in the science and engineering workforce. The improved measurement and understanding of labor market processes and outcomes generated by this research should inform policies to efficiently promote gender equity, scientific productivity and the retention of talented scientists within a population of workers in whom we as a nation have invested enormous resources.