Does the US need more scientists?

NOV 08, 2007

Physics Today

Science Progress : “It is much easier to say we need more scientists and engineers than to talk about equity issues,” explains David Goldston, a visiting scholar at Princeton’s Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs. “We have the largest gap between rich and poor that we’ve had since the Gilded Age,” Goldston said. “How will these policies fit into that?”

Goldston was responding to a question about " Into the Eye of the Storm , a report discussed at a seminar on science and engineering education and workforce demand. The study argues against conventional wisdom to say that U.S. students are improving in performance in math and science and that the number of graduates in science and engineering actually exceeds the available jobs.

Industry and policy professionals alike have argued that declines in the S&E workforce threaten U.S. economic competitiveness, especially with China and India graduating large numbers of scientists and engineers each year.

Instead, Goldston suggests, the US needs to reorient US science and engineering policy not just on producing more engineers and scientists, but ensure that graduates entering these fields have the opportunity to analyze problems and design solutions that make our economy more dynamic and more equitable.