Unemployment Rates for Doctorate Social and Behavioral Scientists
Note: Labor force is defined as those unemployed and seeking work. The unemployment is the ratio of those who are unemployed but seeking work to the total labor force.
Summary:
Doctorate sociologists and other social and behavioral scientists benefited from a solid labor market and experienced unemployment rates of only about one to two percent from1993 and 2001. By 2003, however, the unemployment rates for both sociologists and psychologists with sociologists experiencing unemployment rates of 2.6 percent. While it is unclear whether or not this increase is indicative of a longer-term trend, the increase in unemployment was paralleled by rising involuntary out-of-field rates and rising retirement rates. Despite experiencing higher unemployment, the overall labor force participation rate increased for sociologists (see related charts).
Related charts:
- Labor Force Participation Rates for Doctorate Social and Behavioral Scientists, 1993 - 2006
- Retirement Rates for Doctorate Social and Behavioral Scientists, 1993 - 2006
- Involuntarily Out-of-Field Rates for Doctorate Social and Behavioral Scientists, 1993 - 2003
- Replacement in the Social Sciences: Ratio of the Number of New PhDs Awarded per Each Retiree in Selected Social Science and Behavioral Disciplines, 1993 - 2003
Source:
ASA Computations based on National Science Foundation, Science Resource Statistics, Characteristics of Doctoral Scientists and Engineers in the United States (Arlington, VA: NSF, 1996-2006). Retrieved from http://www.nsf.gov/statistics/nsf09317/content.cfm?pub_id=3920&id=2 (November 12, 2009).
Data: A tabular version of this data in Excel format is available here.