The future of research: Less than 2 per cent of world has PhD; India ranks 4th in doctoral graduates produced

Producing slightly over 24,000 doctoral graduates, India ranks among the highest in terms of people with a doctorate degree. However, what is the quality of research that these scholars generate?
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PhD is the highest educational degree world over .

The highest educational degree world-over, theoretically speaking, is the doctoral degree or the PhD. And as a country and society that believes that education is key to economic growth, it is unsurprising that India ranks among the top PhD producers in the world.
As per data available with the OECD, India ranks fourth among the countries by the number of PhD degrees awarded. It is preceded by the US, Germany and Great Britain. India awards nearly 24000 doctoral degrees annually.
However, the same cannot be said of the rest of the world, which does not seem too interested in the PhD and research avenue, which is an arduous route that usually requires the submission and defence of a thesis, dissertation or equivalent written work of publishable quality that represents an original and significant contribution to knowledge in the respective field(s) of study. As per Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), less than 2 per cent of the world's population has a doctorate degree today. The report titled ‘Enhancing labour market relevance and outcomes of doctoral education’ says that “Doctorate holders represent 1.1 per cent of 25-64 year-olds on average across OECD countries, though this varies from 0.1 per cent or less in Indonesia and Mexico to more than 3 per cent in Slovenia and Switzerland.”
This has been corroborated by the US Census Bureau, which adds that while Slovenia and Switzerland have the highest percentage of the population with a doctorate — at five per cent and three per cent, respectively — only 1.2 per cent of the US population has a PhD. However, producing 68,000 graduates, USA tops the list of countries with the number of doctoral graduates produced on a yearly basis, according to the OECD report.
Age is just a number – not
As per the report, the median age at entry to doctoral programmes is 29 on average across OECD countries. 60 per cent of entrants aged between 26 and 37 years old. Another interesting find in the report was that on an average, 25 per cent of enrolled doctoral graduates were international students across OECD countries. In some countries, international students made up the majority of graduates at doctoral level — more than half are international students in Luxembourg and Switzerland.
The gender (dis)parity
There is a visible and yawning gender gap when it comes to doctoral degrees and employment opportunities therewith. “Women tend to be under-represented in certain fields at doctoral level even where they are over-represented at master’s level. While 54 per cent of graduates in natural science, mathematics and statistics at master’s level were women, they represented only 46 per cent of doctoral graduates on average across OECD countries in 2017.” Talk about the talent pool that remains untapped.
However, what’s encouraging is the employment opportunities after the doctorate for women. The research found that the employment rate of women with a doctorate is five per cent higher than that of women with a master’s on average across OECD countries. The number touches an encouraging 15 per cent or higher in Greece and Hungary.
In contrast, men with a doctorate were found to have an employment rate that is three per cent higher than men with a master’s, on average across OECD countries. Furthermore, this advantage does not exceed eight per cent in any OECD or partner country.
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