Bret Devereaux

In history, that gap only goes back really to 2008, but in some other humanities disciplines, hiring has been underwater since the 90s. The terrifying thing about the history graph is that for the humanities, history is relatively *better* than most. 14/25

All of that then runs into this year. Obvious there's no data for this year, but signs point to a year probably not meaningfully better than 2019 or 2020. But we know one thing that is likely to be higher: PhDs granted. 15/25

Most departments I have knowledge of either formally or informally did the same thing: they extended all of their PhDs an extra year. Which means both the classes of 2020 and 2021 are going to be on the market this year. Along with a *decade's* worth of job debt. 16/25

Of course everyone thinks they have it hard! We are humans and so we can feel our own hardships but can only observe the hardships of others. But, my friends, this is why we have data. And the data tells us that, yes indeed the current situation is *different.* 17/25

I understand why it seems like so many academics off of the job market want to believe that current conditions aren't *that* different from what they experienced. It's comforting, it lets them believe that they got their jobs from merit and not luck... 18/25

...that if they were on this job market today, they'd succeed there too. Those kids, they think, just need to stick it out a year or two, like I did! There's comfort there. But just because something is comforting doesn't make it true. 19/25

Worse yet, that vision provides an excuse not to do anything, to tell one's self that, with a bit of (someone else's) elbow grease, at least the 'worthy' candidates will all find jobs. 20/25