I know that COVID-19 has upended everything, including the academic job market. However, every few years I've gone though PhilJobs and tallied up job-market ads to see what the year's academic job market has been like, and I was curious what this year's market was like so I've gone and done another tally. I realize that PhilJobs isn't a complete sample, as a good number of jobs may only be advertised elsewhere, such as at HigherEdJobs. However, collecting and collating this kind of data is really hard work and PhilJobs is the easiest to work with (by far)--so that is the sample I use each year.
Anyway, this year I did a PhilJobs search for ads posted between August 1st, 2019 and yesterday, April 21st. Given that very few ads are still coming out, this search seems to me to give a pretty good picture of what this year's market looked like--at least before any hires were cancelled due to COVID-19. Because it's not always clear which searches have been cancelled, I have not taken that into account, and anyway I think it's more interesting to learn which kinds of jobs were advertised, even if they did not complete the hires.
A few quick notes. The methodology I've always used in this series works as follows. When I encounter jobs with two AOS;s (e.g. metaphysics, moral philosophy), I counted each job as '.5' jobs in that area (or in the case of 3 AOS, '.33' jobs, etc.). Although I recognize this is a bit odd, it seems to me to make sense, as a job like that could go to someone in any of the listed AOSs, not just one particular AOS. Because I did this with all jobs, the numbers seem to me to accurately weight whether a job is in a particular AOS simpliciter, or whether it was also available to candidates in other AOS. Second, I only counted "junior-level" jobs (i.e. postdocs, lecturer, and Assistant Professor positions), not Associate or Professor level jobs. Third, I only counted academic jobs (leaving the very few non-academic jobs advertised on PhilJobs to the side). Finally, while I tried to get the numbers right, this is just a "quick and dirty" tally, not a formal study. While I don't think there are any major errors, I wouldn't be surprised if made a minor mistake or two. Here is the spreadsheet I put together, if anyone is interested in double-checking things. I'm happy to make any corrections.
In any case, here are a few highlights (readers can dive into the spreadsheet if they want to look at the distribution of jobs within particular AOS's):
TOTAL (junior-level) faculty jobs advertised = 468
- Value theory (ethics, social, political, law) = 153 jobs (32.7%)
- Open AOS: 133.6 jobs (28.5%)
- Science (including cog. sci) = 50 jobs (10.7%)
- Core (mind, language, metaphysics, epistemology, logic) = 44.7 jobs (9.55%)
- History = 43.3 jobs (9.25%)
- Social identity (race, gender, feminism, disability) = 18.5 jobs (4%)
- Non-western: 12.1 jobs (2.6%)
- Continental = 8 jobs (1.7%)
- Religion = 5 jobs (1%)
- Aesthetics = .5 jobs (0.1%)
Junior-level TT jobs advertised = 224
- Value Theory = 76.8 jobs (34.3%)
- Open: 46 jobs (20.5%)
- History: 27.5 jobs (12.3%)
- Science (including cog. sci) = 24.5 jobs (10.9%)
- Core (mind, language, metaphysics, epistemology, logic) = 18.5 jobs (8.3%)
- Social identity (race, gender, feminism, disability, etc.) = 11.7 jobs (5.2%)
- Non-western: 11.6 jobs (5.2%)
- Continental: 7.75 jobs (3.5%)
- Religion: 1.25 jobs (0.6%)
Junior-level Non-TT jobs advertised = 244
- Open = 87.6 jobs (35.9%)
- Value theory = 76.2 jobs (31.2%)
- Core (mind, language, metaphysics, epistemology, logic) =26.2 jobs (10.7%)
- Science (including cog. sci) = 25.2 jobs (10.3%)
- History = 15.8 jobs (6.5%%)
- Social identity = 7.25 jobs (3%)
- Religion = 5 jobs (2%)
- Aesthetics = .5 jobs (0.2%)
- Non-Western philosophy = .5 jobs (0.2%)
- Continental = 0 jobs (0%)
To my eyes, these numbers look pretty similar to recent job seasons. First, the largest proportion of jobs continue to be Open AOS and Value Theory. It is particularly striking to me that each year I have data for this, over 1-in-3 jobs (both TT and non-TT) have been in value theory areas. This also appears to have been a banner year for biomedical ethics specifically, at least at the postdoc level (14.8 non-TT jobs and 5.6 TT jobs). There was also a noticable uptick in jobs having to do with A.I. and technology ethics. More generally, though, there was a pretty even distribution across applied ethics (29 TT jobs), ethics/ethical theory (25 TT jobs), and social-political-legal/PPE areas (21.4 TT jobs). One area notably lacking in advertisements this year, however, was metaethics (0.5 TT jobs by my tally). However, it is entirely possible that some jobs listed as 'Ethics' could go to metaethicists.
Second, 'Core' areas of analytic philosophy are still only 8-10% of jobs advertised, similar to 2017--though it may be that M&E types fare well when applying for 'Open' positions (which there were a lot of this year). It is particularly striking to me that given how many M&E grad students and job-marketeers there presumably are, I have only 5.8 TT jobs listed for Metaphysics and 4.9 for epistemology. Finally, for what it is worth, it also appeared to me that most (though not all) of the job advertisements in epistemology this year were in in social epistemology specifically.
Third, this appears to have been another fairly good year for jobs in Social Identity related areas (race, gender, ethnicity, disability, etc.). In 2017, I tallied 19.3 jobs in these areas (6.5 jobs in feminist philosophy and 12.8 jobs in philosophy of race). This year, there were 18.5 jobs (10.7 in philosophy of race, 5.2 jobs in feminism and gender studies, 2.5 open jobs, and 0.5 jobs in philosophy of disability). This also seems to have been a pretty good year for 'non-Western philosophy' (broadly construed), at least at the TT level (11.6 jobs), including several jobs in indigenous philosophy.
Finally, Philosophy of Science and History of Philosophy have held steady at around 10-12% of jobs apiece, with Philosophy of Science inching up a few percentage points compared to previous years. Given that philosophy of science and history of philosophy plausibly graduate fewer PhDs than some other areas, these numbers seem pretty strong to me. Cognitive science and A.I. areas also seemed to have a very good year (8 TT jobs and 10 nonTT jobs).
This is really interesting data - thanks! One thing to note (though not as a criticism!) is that most UK (and many European) jobs in my experience (including experience of being on the market this year) are not listed on PhilJobs, with other sites preferred. It would be interesting to see the geographical data if you have it, as (entirely based on my own unscientific impression) I would think that PhilJobs data would mainly give a sense of the job market in the US. Again entirely unscientifically, my impression would be similar percentages of AOSs for posts in Europe, with a particularly big year for ethics of AI in Europe this year.
Posted by: UK-Based | 04/22/2020 at 10:55 AM
Thanks! I wasn't aware of that. If you don't mind me asking, where are most UK and European jobs listed?
Unfortunately, I didn't compile geographical data. Collecting just the amount I did yesterday took a lot longer than I expected (when I really should have been working on a paper), and I wasn't thinking about geographical issues. But I'll consider collecting it in future years, time permitting!
Posted by: Marcus Arvan | 04/22/2020 at 11:08 AM
As the name suggests, I know the UK market best, and most jobs here are listed on jobs.ac.uk (at least in my experience).
My experience - very happy to be corrected by those with more experience though - with jobs in the rest of Europe is that many are not listed outside of the universities own websites - not particularly useful when collecting data for this, or for candidates that don't happen to see friends posting about them on social media.
Posted by: UK-Based | 04/22/2020 at 11:15 AM
I was going to add that I'd go through the jobs.ac.uk site and post some data on UK jobs next week--but unfortunately, as far as I can tell, it's impossible to search for jobs with past deadlines.
Posted by: Marcus Arvan | 04/22/2020 at 11:29 AM
Thanks Marcus this is interesting. I shudder thinking of next year's results!
I agree with UK-based that most non-US jobs aren't listed, so this wold seem an analysis of US jobs. Also, few CC jobs are advertised on philjobs, so it is mostly US jobs at 4 year universities.
While I find the numbers interesting and it is good to have them,I think it is hard to make much out of it until we know
1. The number of people in the market with a speciality in each area. My rough guess would be there is about the same number of value theory graduates as M&E graduates, so, in that sense, value theory is doing much better. But I am completely guessing about the graduates.
2. Not knowing who gets hired in open positions is a a major limitation, and any number of results could make a lot of difference for how we see these numbers.
These things below aren't as big as the above two, but I still think important.
1. How many epistemology jobs are in "social epistemology?" Many people who do social epistemology are doing cross work in value theory or feminism.
2. How many value theory jobs are open to, or in fact, hire people doing feminist philosophy (or phil of race, disability, etc)? I think the number would have at least some significance.
3. How many science jobs are in "applied" science? From what I can tell, this number has been increasing.
Posted by: Amanda | 04/22/2020 at 09:21 PM
I haven't kept up on jobs this year, but in past years, when various areas of "non-Western" philosophy were listed as AOSs along with other areas (ethics, epistemology, etc) it has been very rare for the job to go to someone who is a specialist in non-Western. They almost always go to the Western ethicist, epistimologist, etc. So the numbers for non-Western may not end up quite as rosy as they initially seem.
Posted by: Anon1 | 04/23/2020 at 05:29 AM
Concerning positions in Europe I agree with the above. Usually it is country wide, meaning you need to know the website, if there even is any, for the specific country to find positions posted. Some universities only advertise it just on their website. I worked for the maintenance of a philosophy research group and they advertised the position only on that specific research group website, i.e. almost impossible to find unless you check every research group.
Generally though there is only a handful of countries and only a dozen of universities in Europe which might be considered 'high tier'.
That being said, there is something like philjobs offered by the EU which you can find here:
https://euraxess.ec.europa.eu
or for philosophy, excluding religious studies, here with filters:
https://euraxess.ec.europa.eu/jobs/search/field_research_field/ethics-health-sciences-201/field_research_field/ethics-natural-sciences-203/field_research_field/ethics-physical-sciences-205/field_research_field/ethics-social-sciences-207/field_research_field/philosophy-331
Posted by: Illusion of Terra | 04/23/2020 at 06:03 PM
In addition to the websites listed above, many European jobs are advertised on the philos-l mailing list:
https://www.liverpool.ac.uk/philosophy/philos-l/
Posted by: RJ McKenna | 04/28/2020 at 04:24 AM
Marcus, I've broken out the "non-Western" jobs and am in the process of trying to track down hires to see which were hired in a "non-Western" (nw) field and which were not. Readers may be interested in the following:
Of the 13 advertisements which include an nw field:
1 was in China (Huaqiao), 3 were in Canada, 10 in the US.
3 were some kind of indigenous philosophies (1 US, 2 Canada).
3 were Latin/Latinx philosophies. Each of these had at least one disjunct: Decolonial thought; Carribean; Central-South American Indigenous Philosophy and/or Religion; African/Africana.
2 were African/Africana. Each of these had a disjunct: Latin American or Latinx Philosophy, Philosophy of Race.
4 were Asian Philosophy. Of these, one specified "East Asian," another added "esp. Chinese." Three included disjuncts: Comparative Philosophy; Buddhist Philosophy; Social and Political Philosophy
3 were simply AOS in terms of a negation: two "non-Canonical philosophy" and one "non-European philosophy."
Given the disjuncts, at least two of the ads could have been fulfilled without a hire in an nw field, and from what I can tell, one of those was hired in this way (Virginia Tech, where the hire does US social/political philosophy).
Posted by: Malcolm | 04/28/2020 at 09:57 PM
One more addition: I'm trying to track down hires at the "nw" jobs, just to see what the AOS is of the hire. If anyone has information about the positions below, they can email me (c.malcolm.keating , gmail) or edit the spreadsheet.
Note: I am *not* recording the name of the person hired, because I realize people online can get ugly about folks who get jobs. I'm just wondering which of the jobs got filled, and for which disjunctions when there are multiple options for the AOS.
Jobs in "non-Western" fields:
University of Connecticut
Queen's University
Huaqiao
DePaul University
Tulane University
North Texas University
Simon Fraser
Texas A&M
Colorado State
Lake Forest
Occidental
Link to spreadsheet: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1asEjdOgwVn29qR8FerxBeA4aRzXuQlPhpwOzXA4XxLo/edit?usp=sharing
Posted by: Malcolm | 04/29/2020 at 12:36 PM