12 ms·

Ph.D. recipients in computing fields are primarily non-US residents in the US

116 points by ra7 11y ago

chrisbennet 11y ago
Isn't one of the drivers of this something to do with it being a path to work in the US after they (non-resident) get a degree? I could be wrong, but I don't think a PhD is as attractive to people who are already residents. (Generally poor ROI, lack of job prospects, etc.)
- coherentpony 11y ago
  > Isn't one of the drivers of this something to do with it being a path to work in the US after they (non-resident) get a degree? This applies to undergraduate degrees, too. Therefore the argument that restricts it to Ph.D degrees is moot. Furthermore, the 'path to work' is temporary. You still need a a work visa to work once your OPT has expired.
  - rajathagasthya 11y ago
    Agreed, but it's a lot easier + quicker for PhDs to obtain permanent residency as opposed to non-residents having undergraduate or Master's degree.
    - coherentpony 11y ago
      > Agreed, but it's a lot easier + quicker for PhDs to obtain permanent residency as opposed to non-residents having undergraduate or Master's degree. Perhaps. I think that's arguable, though. The only difference it might make is in the initial petition stage. The only situation in which I see holding a Ph.D makes any difference is if, for example, the applicant petitions for residency by claiming they are an "Alien with an extraordinary ability". This is rare enough that I feel it's probably no easier.
  - wtetzner 11y ago
    >> Isn't one of the drivers of this something to do with it being a path to work in the US after they (non-resident) get a degree? >This applies to undergraduate degrees, too. Therefore the argument that restricts it to Ph.D degrees is moot. You seem to have ignored his second point. Yes, it applies to undergraduate degrees, but undergraduate degrees are attractive to residents as well. An undergraduate degree is helpful for getting a good job, whereas a Ph.D doesn't doesn't do much in that regard.
    - coherentpony 11y ago
      > You seem to have ignored his second point. Yes, it applies to undergraduate degrees, but undergraduate degrees are attractive to residents as well. An undergraduate degree is helpful for getting a good job, whereas a Ph.D doesn't doesn't do much in that regard. That's a fair point but I'm not sure the conclusion is necessarily the right one. The US has some of the best universities in the world. It makes sense, if they're unattractive for residents in terms of job prospects, for most of the clientele to be foreign nationals. My point was that it's essentially no easier to get a job (not on OPT) in the US because you were a student in the us. H-1B applicants go through the same process either way, the only difference being that applicants on OPT are already in the country which, I reiterate, doesn't really make the H-1B application any easier.
  - holdenk 11y ago
    I think that undergraduate degrees are generally viewed as the "next step" among many Americans and the ROI is generally viewed as a positive (regardless of it is or not). Also while you do need a work visa once your OPT has expired, PhDs can be used to get EB-2 or as part of EB-2 NIW or EB-1 applications which have much shorter waiting times than EB-3.
  - djb_hackernews 11y ago
    Undergrad degrees aren't the same because the employers that (ab)use the H1B/OPT program only really want masters graduates because it avoids having to declare being an H1B dependent which comes at a cost employers don't want to bear. This is why you have universities like UT Dallas (not to single them out, this is the fact at nearly all universities I'm familiar with, it's just that UT Dallas are one of the few that publishes demographic data) with nearly 100% of its cs graduate students being foreign. It's a nice little system that works out for education institutions and employers but with definite costs to pretty much everyone else.
  - pessimizer 11y ago
    I went to the University of Illinois at Chicago for undergraduate CS, and very few of my classmates grew up in the US. I might be recalling this badly, but I'd say the number was on the order of 10-15%. All of the native-born Americans seemed to be majoring in business and liberal arts. /anecdote We all thought of it as a typical working-class immigrant progression: the first generation goes to engineering school (while working full time), their kids become doctors and lawyers, and their kids become artists, poets, and slackers.
    - cvwright 11y ago
      Reminds me of this quote from John Adams: > I must study politics and war, that our sons may have liberty to study mathematics and philosophy. > > Our sons ought to study mathematics and philosophy, geography, natural history and naval architecture, navigation, commerce and agriculture in order to give their children a right to study painting, poetry, music, architecture, statuary, tapestry, and porcelain. ... edit: argh, formatting.
- malchow 11y ago
  Exactly. Computing Ph Ds are not very attractive to commercially oriented U.S. citizens, because the content can be learned in situ, in books, online, through practice projects, with friends, &c. But computing Ph Ds are great for 1) the small portion of people who want to become academics in the field, and 2) non-citizens looking for a path to transition into the U.S. economy. Unfortunately, this is probably another instance where hidebound immigration policy is creating a bubble (in higher ed) while preventing human capital from attaining its highest and best use (in the private economy (at least for four years)).
  - kd0amg 11y ago
    because the content can be learned in situ, in books, online, through practice projects, with friends, &c. "The content" of a PhD is largely about stuff that's not yet in any books or papers (let alone tutorials and practice exercises). The role of the PhD student is to write them (after discovering that content).
- Legogris 11y ago
  For a lot of people, getting a higher education is not a decision made by economical motivations. When I decided to pursue an MSc, I was well aware that it's very possible that I would have had a higher lifetime income just staying in the industry, or being satisfied with a BSc. It's not about the money.
  - chrisbennet 11y ago
    That is undoubtly one of the drivers but to my point, it would only matter if it was a driver that might explain why non-residents are more likely to get a PhD than residents. I could see that being true. Perhaps non-residents value a PhD for family or cultural reasons more than residents do.
- deleted 11y ago
  [deleted]
spacehome 11y ago
This is primarily a problem with immigration policies and bureaucracy that make it difficult to remain in the U.S. after graduation. Rather, the U.S. should be actively recruiting such high skill people and trying to handhold them through the paperwork. I went through this process with my wife (who also holds a Ph. D. in a technical field, though non-computing), and even being married to a U.S. citizen, the process is so opaque and convoluted and petty, that only the most dedicated would-be immigrants follow through with it.
- johnward 11y ago
  I work with some very capable foreigners. Some of them have been here for almost 10 years and still haven't gotten through the citizenship process. There is something wrong with that.
  - djb_hackernews 11y ago
    > There is something wrong with that. To your employer the system is working as designed.
    - johnward 11y ago
      What is the benefit? When I look h1b salaries they seem higher than normal but do they no include benefits or something?
      - djb_hackernews 11y ago
        I couldn't really say anything about the H1B program that hasn't already been said (you can see my post history as I've posted about it a few times myself) Basically the way the program is run gives a lot of power to employers and very little power to employees. In terms of salaries there are a few tricks employers use to suppress wages. Wages are set* by the department of labor but the data is very inconsistent which means you can hire someone as a level 4 software engineer with a market salary of 130k or you can hire her as a level 1 systems analyst at 65k... which do you think the employer picks? A big problem besides the nebulousness of it all is there isn't anyone responsible on the other side to verify. * actually employers can submit their own wage data to support the wages given, which is just insane.
Taylor_OD 11y ago
As a tech recruiter this does not surprise me. I have met exactly 1 CS PhD in the last 9 months that was a US born Citizen.
- santaclaus 11y ago
  That is a bit surprising. When pursuing my CS PhD the breakdown felt closer to 60/40 non-US vs. US citizens. US born citizens were certainly outnumbered, but not to the degree that you observed. This was in NYC, however, the breakdown could vary geographically, perhaps?
  - timtadh 11y ago
    Depends on the institution. I understand that higher tier research universities have a better graduate student ratio for domestic/non-domestic. My institution seems closer to 90% non-domestic for EECS PhD students.
  - pincubator 11y ago
    I did my PhD in mid-west, and I literally only met 2 American PhD students during my entire PhD (majority was Chinese and Indian students who pursue a PhD as a gateway to a top job). I guess location is a big factor.
    - sjg007 11y ago
      Mid-west is probably a good choice since you can afford to live there on a stipend. Other coastal places not so much.
      - pincubator 11y ago
        It also makes sense why there are less American PhD students in those kind of locations when you look from their perspective. If I were an American, there was no way for me to spend 5+ years of my life in mid-west with 1500K a month (instead, I could just lend to a top company in a good location with $$$$). But for most of the foreign nationals, such an experience is OK to bear with in return for a better life standard.
guelo 11y ago
Good thing immigrants go to graduate school or CS research would completely cease in this country since everyone else is trying to cash in.
blackguardx 11y ago
From my anecdotal evidence in grad school, this is largely true across many other engineering fields as well. I think some of it is driven by immigration policies and some by culture. A Ph.D. in the US doesn't get you as much respect these days as it used to. Other cultures place more value on higher education. Also, in a lot of other countries, you can't do much with just an undergraduate degree.
- HLRoku 11y ago
  This is pure speculation, but I think the devaluation on PhDs in America might have to do a lot with the large of influx of people in college just attending to "get a degree". I feel this made colleges more of a business than a place of learning with the large increase in revenues, and thus leading to PhDs and fields that aren't as respected or really don't have a basis for being around other than people are willing to pay for it.
samfisher83 11y ago
A reason why some people get PhD is it makes it easier to get residency. Citizens don't have the same incentive.
deleted 11y ago
[deleted]
raincom 11y ago
It is not just Ph.D; it is the case in M.S in STEM fields. 99% of Masters students in STEM are foreigners, most of them are Indians and Chinese. Usually, these foreign master students puzzle why American citizens don't pursue masters.
- munin 11y ago
  Because masters degrees are for suckers? Especially paying for one?
  - zhemao 11y ago
    This may be the case in CS, but for EE and other engineering fields, a master's degree is definitely worth it. The expanded job opportunities and differences in starting pay are worth the tuition most of the time.
    - nmrm2 11y ago
      In CS it makes sense it pretty much only makes sense you're going from an unkown school to a top school.
  - 6stringmerc 11y ago
    I've heard this as well - that a Masters in Biology/Genetics/etc science fields is, essentially speaking, a consolation prize for washing out. The best job (initial) prospect for people who hold that degree is teaching at a Community College. I don't mean that as a condescending thing, I just basically agree that the ROI is...not good...
    - nmrm2 11y ago
      ... or any job they could've gotten with a bachelors.
  - jerf 11y ago
    Really, really unconvinced that's the case for computer science. Graduate level classes are definitely yet another cut above undergrad classes, and a lot of the sub-fields that are heating up right now are currently graduate-level only, and in many cases, likely to stay that way. You just aren't going to get into serious machine learning or computer vision in an undergrad course, without rewriting the entire required curriculum for that explicit purpose. (The prerequisites for those things are already considered senior-level courses.) Disclaimer: I have one, but they paid me for it. I got it 2000-2002; a moment's thought will reveal why I thought that was a good way to spend those years.... (Spoiler: Which is better, being paid to get a grad-level degree or unemployment?)
wang_li 11y ago
When you start enrolling more foreign students, is it a surprise when more of your graduates are foreign students? During the recession colleges and universities focused on non-resident student enrollment as a way to sustain budgets. http://www.bing.com/search?q=ratio+of+foreign+to+native+in+college http://www.bing.com/search?q=ratio+of+foreign+to+native+in+c...
- forgetsusername 11y ago
  >s it a surprise when more of your graduates are foreign students? This isn't a case of merely an increase in foreign student PhD's. It's that the degrees are primarily foreign students, even though as your link shows, they are a minority of students on campus. Side note, I love that they decided to show the distance scale on the map.
- sackofmugs 11y ago
  You're talking about undergrads. PhD foreign students are paid by the university, not payers into budgets. So it's actually the opposite effect.
  - drzaiusapelord 11y ago
    The recession was 6+ years ago, perfect timing for those undergrads to become grad/phd students. I think his point still stands.
  - justincormack 11y ago
    I don't think that is true. Some are but most foreign PhD students are paying their own way or being paid externally.
- aet 11y ago
  Yes, it is opposite in grad school. Recessions bring U.S. students. In a booming economy, qualified students take high-paying jobs. In a recession, they ride it out in grad school. (I only have anecdotal evidence for this claim.)
johnward 11y ago
I don't know much about the doctorate process but do these people get scholarships/sponsorships? Most of the time those appear to be favored towards foreign students.
- pgbovine 11y ago
  The opposite is true. Many federal research scholarships are open only to U.S. citizens or at least permanent residents.
tosseraccount 11y ago
"an internal report in the National Science Foundation, a key government agency, actually advocated the use of the H-1B program as a means of holding down PhD salaries, by flooding the job market with foreign students. The NSF added that the stagnation of salaries would push domestic students away from PhD study, which is exactly what has happened". http://heather.cs.ucdavis.edu/h1b10min.html http://heather.cs.ucdavis.edu/h1b10min.html
lighthawk 11y ago
Interesting data, but it seems like the CRA could use some data visualization help. Instead of a rich gradient of color to indicate percent, it chooses a small subset of shades (and texture). I know- this is common, but since many percentages are close to 50%, it makes them stand apart too much. And then there is the mostly useless indicator of metric distance: the U.S. uses miles as the standard not km, and if you don't know how big the U.S. is, then the data in this map is probably of no use to you. Finally, a dotted texture was used that looks pretty 1990s, so it stands out too much with the others being solid colors. The colors aren't even in the same palette or color family. And the orange dots seem too fat and clash with at least one of those greens.
calcsam 11y ago
There was a joke in the Stanford economics department a few years ago: "There are two American professors in the department, and one of them is named Bhattacharya"
brightball 11y ago
This is because of the field itself more than any other policies. I have an undergrad degree in Computer Information Systems. That was VERY appealing when I knew nothing about programming, the field, etc. After having been in the field for 15 years, there are a few things that become very clear: 1. I did not need an undergraduate degree to do this. Some fields you need formal education in a controlled setting. This isn't one of them. 2. There is virtually nothing in this field that I feel I couldn't learn given books and free time 3. I am married with 2 kids and a good job. To pursue a PhD I've got to either put my job and my income on hold to go pursue it (while taking on the expense) OR pursue it in my spare time and encroach on my children's childhood. Neither are worth it. 4. Virtually nothing to gain FROM the PhD I also have a Master's but I got that in a business field instead, which is tremendously harder to just get from books. Experience and connections in business are huge and that degree was worth every penny. At this point, if I went back to school for anything it would probably be Law, Statistics or Finance. There's just nothing in the field of computing that I believe couldn't be better learned by experience.
- yid 11y ago
  > There's just nothing in the field of computing that I believe couldn't be better learned by experience. The rest of your post makes sense, but you lost me at this sentiment. There is a lot more to computing that information systems and programming. I'm glad your career worked out, but there is certainly much in CS that you will simply never learn in the field.
  - anthonybsd 11y ago
    > but there is certainly much in CS that you will simply never learn in the field. Like what? In other words, what parts of undergrad CS could you not learn on your own from the books given reasonable amount of time, you figure?
    - minionslave 11y ago
      Someone's got to research the theories that you've read in the books. These are the kind of things you won't be able to learn in your spare time.
dopeboy 11y ago
Not surprising. I went to a public (UC) school for undergraduate and a private school for a graduate degree. > 90% of my TAs (who were on the PhD track) in both programs were from abroad.
crayg33k 11y ago
The comments in this discussion that talk about how foreign nationals look at a PhD as a short-cut to getting permanent residency infuriates me. I have a CS PhD from a reputable mid-west school. I am also not a US citizen. When a person is considering investing 5-7 years of his/her life into a PhD program, I am quite certain the US immigration policy is not a motivating factor by any measure. You can apply for permanent residency under the EB-2 quota even with a Masters. The EB-1 quota is for "outstanding researchers" with truly exceptional skills, and who have made significant impact in their field of research. All the non-American PhD students I have met in my life (and I have met a LOT of them) have a real drive to innovate and be someone in their field of research. Sure, higher salaries (if they decide to enter the industry, as opposed to academia) are a strong motivation to some of them, but I doubt if permanent residency is.
- goodcjw2 11y ago
  Agreed. Getting a PhD is never a short-cut to anything
- geebee 11y ago
  I agree that it's possible to overstate the influence of immigration policy but I really don't agree that it is "not a motivating factor by any measure". When I was in grad school at Berkeley (didn't finish, dropped out with an MS), many international students were quite open about the benefits of a grad degree in gaining US residency, and expressed irritation that other fields weren't as open as STEM. These are just our anecdotes, but there is some data to support this. Take a look at this study from the RAND institute (historically a very pro-immigrant think tank) that compares STEM PhD programs to other options available to highly educated people with choice and concludes that the decision to avoid STEM graduate programs (PhD in particular) is a rational response to market conditions relative to the professions. http://www.rand.org/pubs/issue_papers/IP241.html http://www.rand.org/pubs/issue_papers/IP241.html A more general audience report on this research: http://usatoday30.usatoday.com/tech/science/2009-07-08-science-engineer-jobs_N.htm http://usatoday30.usatoday.com/tech/science/2009-07-08-scien... Here's the thing - those "professions" are much more closed off to international students than STEM graduate programs. This absolutely influences choice! It's pretty clear that some fields and paths to graduate study in the US are far more open to non-citizens than others, and that visa programs targeting STEM fields do provide an extra incentive for non-citizens to go into STEM graduate programs rather than other study paths. This doesn't make it the only reason, or the main motivation, but I'd say it is a motivating factor to go to grad school. I tend to agree with you that once the MS is achieved, the motivation would be lower, but it still influences the field of study.
gjkood 11y ago
A study forwarded by another HN member in another similar discussion. Very interesting statistics. https://www.insidehighered.com/news/2013/07/12/new-report-shows-dependence-us-graduate-programs-foreign-students https://www.insidehighered.com/news/2013/07/12/new-report-sh...
PaulHoule 11y ago
I think this is true for PhD's in all male-dominated fields. (And it has a lot to do with male domination because the foreign students lean strongly male)
donatj 11y ago
I'd imagine it's at least in part cultural. I got a job developing after receiving a two year degree almost ten years ago now, and have felt almost zero pressure to pursue further degrees. My career has grown beyond what I ever imagined too. American development shops and developers in my experience value degrees far less than actual experience and ability. You can jump right in and start having actual experience or you can spend 6 years in school and come out behind your peers. My 2¢ anyway.
robotresearcher 11y ago
Many of the best research universities in the world are in the US. 95%+ of the world's population is not. The best schools have access to the global talent pool, so if the system is working even fairly well to identify great students, you would expect most PhD candidates to be from elsewhere.
revelation 11y ago
Something that wasn't mentioned here: a Ph.D. in the US is a great way to increase your chances for an offer for professorship back home in Europe (or anywhere, really). That will skew the number towards people who fully intend to leave after getting their Ph.D. as naturally US naturals can derive no such benefit. In fact, if we imagine the opposite holds, they might well be penalized for getting their Ph.D. at a US university.
- robotresearcher 11y ago
  This effect could be explained by the international standing of the university without recourse to inverse-nationalist bias. A Stanford degree is better for an Italian than a Sapienza Rome degree. But a Cambridge degree is better for an American than a Georgia Tech degree. Since the US has lots of top-tier universities, you see lots of American-trained professors in European schools.
sjg007 11y ago
One factor is the hot job market which US citizens have direct access to.
marme 11y ago
This is a major reason for reform of the visa system. If you get a US PhD you should be guaranteed a US visa. Studying a STEM PhD is free and mostly paid for by public grants aka tax dollars. If you force these people to leave you are using tax dollars to train them to go back and contribute to another country's economy. Instead they should be heavily incentivized to stay in the US and grow the US economy since we already wasted time training them. For years China and India have been suffering brain drain to the US with their best researchers and engineers coming to the US but at least in china there has been a shift with more and more Chinese PhD grads choosing to go back most of which is because it is just too hard to stay in the US. They go back and work for upcoming tech giants like alibaba and other companies that are competing with US companies. So US companies are facing more competition from companies whose workers are trained in the US with grant money from US tax payers
digitalzombie 11y ago
I've seen people arguing that you don't need a degree. I think getting a BS in Comp Sci was the best decision I've made. It made me well rounded and I've done many different things within the field of comp sci (web dev, full stack, mobile, etc...). But I'm going back for a master in statistic so I can do data science. I don't believe a master in comp sci would help much because I have the foundation of BS in Comp Sci to pick up most comp sci book and further myself in CompSci.

116 points by ra7 11y ago

Isn't one of the drivers of this something to do with it being a path to work in the US after they (non-resident) get a degree? I could be wrong, but I don't think a PhD is as attractive to people who are already residents. (Generally poor ROI, lack of job prospects, etc.)

coherentpony 11y ago
> Isn't one of the drivers of this something to do with it being a path to work in the US after they (non-resident) get a degree? This applies to undergraduate degrees, too. Therefore the argument that restricts it to Ph.D degrees is moot. Furthermore, the 'path to work' is temporary. You still need a a work visa to work once your OPT has expired.
- rajathagasthya 11y ago
  Agreed, but it's a lot easier + quicker for PhDs to obtain permanent residency as opposed to non-residents having undergraduate or Master's degree.
  - coherentpony 11y ago
    > Agreed, but it's a lot easier + quicker for PhDs to obtain permanent residency as opposed to non-residents having undergraduate or Master's degree. Perhaps. I think that's arguable, though. The only difference it might make is in the initial petition stage. The only situation in which I see holding a Ph.D makes any difference is if, for example, the applicant petitions for residency by claiming they are an "Alien with an extraordinary ability". This is rare enough that I feel it's probably no easier.
- wtetzner 11y ago
  >> Isn't one of the drivers of this something to do with it being a path to work in the US after they (non-resident) get a degree? >This applies to undergraduate degrees, too. Therefore the argument that restricts it to Ph.D degrees is moot. You seem to have ignored his second point. Yes, it applies to undergraduate degrees, but undergraduate degrees are attractive to residents as well. An undergraduate degree is helpful for getting a good job, whereas a Ph.D doesn't doesn't do much in that regard.
  - coherentpony 11y ago
    > You seem to have ignored his second point. Yes, it applies to undergraduate degrees, but undergraduate degrees are attractive to residents as well. An undergraduate degree is helpful for getting a good job, whereas a Ph.D doesn't doesn't do much in that regard. That's a fair point but I'm not sure the conclusion is necessarily the right one. The US has some of the best universities in the world. It makes sense, if they're unattractive for residents in terms of job prospects, for most of the clientele to be foreign nationals. My point was that it's essentially no easier to get a job (not on OPT) in the US because you were a student in the us. H-1B applicants go through the same process either way, the only difference being that applicants on OPT are already in the country which, I reiterate, doesn't really make the H-1B application any easier.
- holdenk 11y ago
  I think that undergraduate degrees are generally viewed as the "next step" among many Americans and the ROI is generally viewed as a positive (regardless of it is or not). Also while you do need a work visa once your OPT has expired, PhDs can be used to get EB-2 or as part of EB-2 NIW or EB-1 applications which have much shorter waiting times than EB-3.
- djb_hackernews 11y ago
  Undergrad degrees aren't the same because the employers that (ab)use the H1B/OPT program only really want masters graduates because it avoids having to declare being an H1B dependent which comes at a cost employers don't want to bear. This is why you have universities like UT Dallas (not to single them out, this is the fact at nearly all universities I'm familiar with, it's just that UT Dallas are one of the few that publishes demographic data) with nearly 100% of its cs graduate students being foreign. It's a nice little system that works out for education institutions and employers but with definite costs to pretty much everyone else.
- pessimizer 11y ago
  I went to the University of Illinois at Chicago for undergraduate CS, and very few of my classmates grew up in the US. I might be recalling this badly, but I'd say the number was on the order of 10-15%. All of the native-born Americans seemed to be majoring in business and liberal arts. /anecdote We all thought of it as a typical working-class immigrant progression: the first generation goes to engineering school (while working full time), their kids become doctors and lawyers, and their kids become artists, poets, and slackers.
  - cvwright 11y ago
    Reminds me of this quote from John Adams: > I must study politics and war, that our sons may have liberty to study mathematics and philosophy. > > Our sons ought to study mathematics and philosophy, geography, natural history and naval architecture, navigation, commerce and agriculture in order to give their children a right to study painting, poetry, music, architecture, statuary, tapestry, and porcelain. ... edit: argh, formatting.
malchow 11y ago
Exactly. Computing Ph Ds are not very attractive to commercially oriented U.S. citizens, because the content can be learned in situ, in books, online, through practice projects, with friends, &c. But computing Ph Ds are great for 1) the small portion of people who want to become academics in the field, and 2) non-citizens looking for a path to transition into the U.S. economy. Unfortunately, this is probably another instance where hidebound immigration policy is creating a bubble (in higher ed) while preventing human capital from attaining its highest and best use (in the private economy (at least for four years)).
- kd0amg 11y ago
  because the content can be learned in situ, in books, online, through practice projects, with friends, &c. "The content" of a PhD is largely about stuff that's not yet in any books or papers (let alone tutorials and practice exercises). The role of the PhD student is to write them (after discovering that content).
Legogris 11y ago
For a lot of people, getting a higher education is not a decision made by economical motivations. When I decided to pursue an MSc, I was well aware that it's very possible that I would have had a higher lifetime income just staying in the industry, or being satisfied with a BSc. It's not about the money.
- chrisbennet 11y ago
  That is undoubtly one of the drivers but to my point, it would only matter if it was a driver that might explain why non-residents are more likely to get a PhD than residents. I could see that being true. Perhaps non-residents value a PhD for family or cultural reasons more than residents do.
deleted 11y ago
[deleted]

spacehome 11y ago

This is primarily a problem with immigration policies and bureaucracy that make it difficult to remain in the U.S. after graduation. Rather, the U.S. should be actively recruiting such high skill people and trying to handhold them through the paperwork. I went through this process with my wife (who also holds a Ph. D. in a technical field, though non-computing), and even being married to a U.S. citizen, the process is so opaque and convoluted and petty, that only the most dedicated would-be immigrants follow through with it.

johnward 11y ago
I work with some very capable foreigners. Some of them have been here for almost 10 years and still haven't gotten through the citizenship process. There is something wrong with that.
- djb_hackernews 11y ago
  > There is something wrong with that. To your employer the system is working as designed.
  - johnward 11y ago
    What is the benefit? When I look h1b salaries they seem higher than normal but do they no include benefits or something?
    - djb_hackernews 11y ago
      I couldn't really say anything about the H1B program that hasn't already been said (you can see my post history as I've posted about it a few times myself) Basically the way the program is run gives a lot of power to employers and very little power to employees. In terms of salaries there are a few tricks employers use to suppress wages. Wages are set* by the department of labor but the data is very inconsistent which means you can hire someone as a level 4 software engineer with a market salary of 130k or you can hire her as a level 1 systems analyst at 65k... which do you think the employer picks? A big problem besides the nebulousness of it all is there isn't anyone responsible on the other side to verify. * actually employers can submit their own wage data to support the wages given, which is just insane.

Taylor_OD 11y ago

As a tech recruiter this does not surprise me. I have met exactly 1 CS PhD in the last 9 months that was a US born Citizen.

santaclaus 11y ago
That is a bit surprising. When pursuing my CS PhD the breakdown felt closer to 60/40 non-US vs. US citizens. US born citizens were certainly outnumbered, but not to the degree that you observed. This was in NYC, however, the breakdown could vary geographically, perhaps?
- timtadh 11y ago
  Depends on the institution. I understand that higher tier research universities have a better graduate student ratio for domestic/non-domestic. My institution seems closer to 90% non-domestic for EECS PhD students.
- pincubator 11y ago
  I did my PhD in mid-west, and I literally only met 2 American PhD students during my entire PhD (majority was Chinese and Indian students who pursue a PhD as a gateway to a top job). I guess location is a big factor.
  - sjg007 11y ago
    Mid-west is probably a good choice since you can afford to live there on a stipend. Other coastal places not so much.
    - pincubator 11y ago
      It also makes sense why there are less American PhD students in those kind of locations when you look from their perspective. If I were an American, there was no way for me to spend 5+ years of my life in mid-west with 1500K a month (instead, I could just lend to a top company in a good location with $$$$). But for most of the foreign nationals, such an experience is OK to bear with in return for a better life standard.

guelo 11y ago

Good thing immigrants go to graduate school or CS research would completely cease in this country since everyone else is trying to cash in.

blackguardx 11y ago

From my anecdotal evidence in grad school, this is largely true across many other engineering fields as well. I think some of it is driven by immigration policies and some by culture. A Ph.D. in the US doesn't get you as much respect these days as it used to. Other cultures place more value on higher education. Also, in a lot of other countries, you can't do much with just an undergraduate degree.

HLRoku 11y ago
This is pure speculation, but I think the devaluation on PhDs in America might have to do a lot with the large of influx of people in college just attending to "get a degree". I feel this made colleges more of a business than a place of learning with the large increase in revenues, and thus leading to PhDs and fields that aren't as respected or really don't have a basis for being around other than people are willing to pay for it.

samfisher83 11y ago

A reason why some people get PhD is it makes it easier to get residency. Citizens don't have the same incentive.

deleted 11y ago

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raincom 11y ago

It is not just Ph.D; it is the case in M.S in STEM fields. 99% of Masters students in STEM are foreigners, most of them are Indians and Chinese. Usually, these foreign master students puzzle why American citizens don't pursue masters.

munin 11y ago
Because masters degrees are for suckers? Especially paying for one?
- zhemao 11y ago
  This may be the case in CS, but for EE and other engineering fields, a master's degree is definitely worth it. The expanded job opportunities and differences in starting pay are worth the tuition most of the time.
  - nmrm2 11y ago
    In CS it makes sense it pretty much only makes sense you're going from an unkown school to a top school.
- 6stringmerc 11y ago
  I've heard this as well - that a Masters in Biology/Genetics/etc science fields is, essentially speaking, a consolation prize for washing out. The best job (initial) prospect for people who hold that degree is teaching at a Community College. I don't mean that as a condescending thing, I just basically agree that the ROI is...not good...
  - nmrm2 11y ago
    ... or any job they could've gotten with a bachelors.
- jerf 11y ago
  Really, really unconvinced that's the case for computer science. Graduate level classes are definitely yet another cut above undergrad classes, and a lot of the sub-fields that are heating up right now are currently graduate-level only, and in many cases, likely to stay that way. You just aren't going to get into serious machine learning or computer vision in an undergrad course, without rewriting the entire required curriculum for that explicit purpose. (The prerequisites for those things are already considered senior-level courses.) Disclaimer: I have one, but they paid me for it. I got it 2000-2002; a moment's thought will reveal why I thought that was a good way to spend those years.... (Spoiler: Which is better, being paid to get a grad-level degree or unemployment?)

wang_li 11y ago

When you start enrolling more foreign students, is it a surprise when more of your graduates are foreign students? During the recession colleges and universities focused on non-resident student enrollment as a way to sustain budgets. http://www.bing.com/search?q=ratio+of+foreign+to+native+in+college http://www.bing.com/search?q=ratio+of+foreign+to+native+in+c...

forgetsusername 11y ago
>s it a surprise when more of your graduates are foreign students? This isn't a case of merely an increase in foreign student PhD's. It's that the degrees are primarily foreign students, even though as your link shows, they are a minority of students on campus. Side note, I love that they decided to show the distance scale on the map.
sackofmugs 11y ago
You're talking about undergrads. PhD foreign students are paid by the university, not payers into budgets. So it's actually the opposite effect.
- drzaiusapelord 11y ago
  The recession was 6+ years ago, perfect timing for those undergrads to become grad/phd students. I think his point still stands.
- justincormack 11y ago
  I don't think that is true. Some are but most foreign PhD students are paying their own way or being paid externally.
aet 11y ago
Yes, it is opposite in grad school. Recessions bring U.S. students. In a booming economy, qualified students take high-paying jobs. In a recession, they ride it out in grad school. (I only have anecdotal evidence for this claim.)

johnward 11y ago

I don't know much about the doctorate process but do these people get scholarships/sponsorships? Most of the time those appear to be favored towards foreign students.

pgbovine 11y ago
The opposite is true. Many federal research scholarships are open only to U.S. citizens or at least permanent residents.

tosseraccount 11y ago

"an internal report in the National Science Foundation, a key government agency, actually advocated the use of the H-1B program as a means of holding down PhD salaries, by flooding the job market with foreign students. The NSF added that the stagnation of salaries would push domestic students away from PhD study, which is exactly what has happened". http://heather.cs.ucdavis.edu/h1b10min.html http://heather.cs.ucdavis.edu/h1b10min.html

lighthawk 11y ago

Interesting data, but it seems like the CRA could use some data visualization help. Instead of a rich gradient of color to indicate percent, it chooses a small subset of shades (and texture). I know- this is common, but since many percentages are close to 50%, it makes them stand apart too much. And then there is the mostly useless indicator of metric distance: the U.S. uses miles as the standard not km, and if you don't know how big the U.S. is, then the data in this map is probably of no use to you. Finally, a dotted texture was used that looks pretty 1990s, so it stands out too much with the others being solid colors. The colors aren't even in the same palette or color family. And the orange dots seem too fat and clash with at least one of those greens.

calcsam 11y ago

There was a joke in the Stanford economics department a few years ago: "There are two American professors in the department, and one of them is named Bhattacharya"

brightball 11y ago

This is because of the field itself more than any other policies. I have an undergrad degree in Computer Information Systems. That was VERY appealing when I knew nothing about programming, the field, etc. After having been in the field for 15 years, there are a few things that become very clear: 1. I did not need an undergraduate degree to do this. Some fields you need formal education in a controlled setting. This isn't one of them. 2. There is virtually nothing in this field that I feel I couldn't learn given books and free time 3. I am married with 2 kids and a good job. To pursue a PhD I've got to either put my job and my income on hold to go pursue it (while taking on the expense) OR pursue it in my spare time and encroach on my children's childhood. Neither are worth it. 4. Virtually nothing to gain FROM the PhD I also have a Master's but I got that in a business field instead, which is tremendously harder to just get from books. Experience and connections in business are huge and that degree was worth every penny. At this point, if I went back to school for anything it would probably be Law, Statistics or Finance. There's just nothing in the field of computing that I believe couldn't be better learned by experience.

yid 11y ago
> There's just nothing in the field of computing that I believe couldn't be better learned by experience. The rest of your post makes sense, but you lost me at this sentiment. There is a lot more to computing that information systems and programming. I'm glad your career worked out, but there is certainly much in CS that you will simply never learn in the field.
- anthonybsd 11y ago
  > but there is certainly much in CS that you will simply never learn in the field. Like what? In other words, what parts of undergrad CS could you not learn on your own from the books given reasonable amount of time, you figure?
  - minionslave 11y ago
    Someone's got to research the theories that you've read in the books. These are the kind of things you won't be able to learn in your spare time.

dopeboy 11y ago

Not surprising. I went to a public (UC) school for undergraduate and a private school for a graduate degree. > 90% of my TAs (who were on the PhD track) in both programs were from abroad.

crayg33k 11y ago

The comments in this discussion that talk about how foreign nationals look at a PhD as a short-cut to getting permanent residency infuriates me. I have a CS PhD from a reputable mid-west school. I am also not a US citizen. When a person is considering investing 5-7 years of his/her life into a PhD program, I am quite certain the US immigration policy is not a motivating factor by any measure. You can apply for permanent residency under the EB-2 quota even with a Masters. The EB-1 quota is for "outstanding researchers" with truly exceptional skills, and who have made significant impact in their field of research. All the non-American PhD students I have met in my life (and I have met a LOT of them) have a real drive to innovate and be someone in their field of research. Sure, higher salaries (if they decide to enter the industry, as opposed to academia) are a strong motivation to some of them, but I doubt if permanent residency is.

goodcjw2 11y ago
Agreed. Getting a PhD is never a short-cut to anything
geebee 11y ago
I agree that it's possible to overstate the influence of immigration policy but I really don't agree that it is "not a motivating factor by any measure". When I was in grad school at Berkeley (didn't finish, dropped out with an MS), many international students were quite open about the benefits of a grad degree in gaining US residency, and expressed irritation that other fields weren't as open as STEM. These are just our anecdotes, but there is some data to support this. Take a look at this study from the RAND institute (historically a very pro-immigrant think tank) that compares STEM PhD programs to other options available to highly educated people with choice and concludes that the decision to avoid STEM graduate programs (PhD in particular) is a rational response to market conditions relative to the professions. http://www.rand.org/pubs/issue_papers/IP241.html http://www.rand.org/pubs/issue_papers/IP241.html A more general audience report on this research: http://usatoday30.usatoday.com/tech/science/2009-07-08-science-engineer-jobs_N.htm http://usatoday30.usatoday.com/tech/science/2009-07-08-scien... Here's the thing - those "professions" are much more closed off to international students than STEM graduate programs. This absolutely influences choice! It's pretty clear that some fields and paths to graduate study in the US are far more open to non-citizens than others, and that visa programs targeting STEM fields do provide an extra incentive for non-citizens to go into STEM graduate programs rather than other study paths. This doesn't make it the only reason, or the main motivation, but I'd say it is a motivating factor to go to grad school. I tend to agree with you that once the MS is achieved, the motivation would be lower, but it still influences the field of study.

gjkood 11y ago

A study forwarded by another HN member in another similar discussion. Very interesting statistics. https://www.insidehighered.com/news/2013/07/12/new-report-shows-dependence-us-graduate-programs-foreign-students https://www.insidehighered.com/news/2013/07/12/new-report-sh...

PaulHoule 11y ago

I think this is true for PhD's in all male-dominated fields. (And it has a lot to do with male domination because the foreign students lean strongly male)

donatj 11y ago

I'd imagine it's at least in part cultural. I got a job developing after receiving a two year degree almost ten years ago now, and have felt almost zero pressure to pursue further degrees. My career has grown beyond what I ever imagined too. American development shops and developers in my experience value degrees far less than actual experience and ability. You can jump right in and start having actual experience or you can spend 6 years in school and come out behind your peers. My 2¢ anyway.

robotresearcher 11y ago

Many of the best research universities in the world are in the US. 95%+ of the world's population is not. The best schools have access to the global talent pool, so if the system is working even fairly well to identify great students, you would expect most PhD candidates to be from elsewhere.

revelation 11y ago

Something that wasn't mentioned here: a Ph.D. in the US is a great way to increase your chances for an offer for professorship back home in Europe (or anywhere, really). That will skew the number towards people who fully intend to leave after getting their Ph.D. as naturally US naturals can derive no such benefit. In fact, if we imagine the opposite holds, they might well be penalized for getting their Ph.D. at a US university.

robotresearcher 11y ago
This effect could be explained by the international standing of the university without recourse to inverse-nationalist bias. A Stanford degree is better for an Italian than a Sapienza Rome degree. But a Cambridge degree is better for an American than a Georgia Tech degree. Since the US has lots of top-tier universities, you see lots of American-trained professors in European schools.

sjg007 11y ago

One factor is the hot job market which US citizens have direct access to.

marme 11y ago

This is a major reason for reform of the visa system. If you get a US PhD you should be guaranteed a US visa. Studying a STEM PhD is free and mostly paid for by public grants aka tax dollars. If you force these people to leave you are using tax dollars to train them to go back and contribute to another country's economy. Instead they should be heavily incentivized to stay in the US and grow the US economy since we already wasted time training them. For years China and India have been suffering brain drain to the US with their best researchers and engineers coming to the US but at least in china there has been a shift with more and more Chinese PhD grads choosing to go back most of which is because it is just too hard to stay in the US. They go back and work for upcoming tech giants like alibaba and other companies that are competing with US companies. So US companies are facing more competition from companies whose workers are trained in the US with grant money from US tax payers

digitalzombie 11y ago

I've seen people arguing that you don't need a degree. I think getting a BS in Comp Sci was the best decision I've made. It made me well rounded and I've done many different things within the field of comp sci (web dev, full stack, mobile, etc...). But I'm going back for a master in statistic so I can do data science. I don't believe a master in comp sci would help much because I have the foundation of BS in Comp Sci to pick up most comp sci book and further myself in CompSci.