The Early Careers of Social Science Graduates and the Value of a Phd

To look at the relevance of a PhD to the careers of graduates in the social sciences, the Economic and Social Research Council commissioned a survey of a sample of graduates in certain social science subjects who gained first‐ or upper second‐class honours degrees at British universities between 1972 and 1977. A substantial proportion of respondents with PhDs, and especially of those who also held first‐class honours, had become university teachers. The rest were scattered over a wide range of jobs, but few of them had needed a PhD to gain their first job after completing their studies, and there was no job group where the majority of respondents said that they had needed a PhD to do their first job well. In all job groups there were some respondents who regarded skills in research as relevant to their jobs, but other qualities imparted by a university, such as a training of the mind, were generally regarded as more relevant. Graduates with no university level post‐graduate qualifications were generally paid more than those with a PhD, implying that employers put a higher value on experience in employment than on post‐graduate research.