After the alarming recent headlines warning us of an impending recession/depression/apocalypse, I was wondering about the possible impact it might have on our little corner of the world.

Do people think it would affect the amount or types of funding available, for example? I'd imagine academia as a whole would not be priority for government.

There's certainly no precedent for such (non-wartime) economic problems in my 35-year-old life, if the headlines are to be believed. Does anyone well informed have any ideas about what could happen? Wild speculation from the ill-informed also welcome! 8-)

Hope not too depressing an enquiry... :$

Me and some friends were discussing this the other day. An ill-informed guess is that Academia would do quite well out of recessions because alot of people return to study if they can't get a job - so a decent source of income for universities and perhaps a better chance for each of us to get a lectureship. How this affects the other streams of funding of academia I can't really say!

I was thinking about this too, and basically no I don't think it will adversely affect academia to any great extent.

There are two exceptions though:
1. The MBA market may take a downturn (this has been reported). One of the first cut backs companies are making is funding MBAs for employees. This could have a big impact on management schools and their swish facilities.
2. International students may go elsewhere. This is a lucrative market for many universities (especially in London), but students are now realising the 'rip-off' element and going to Australia, the US or Canada instead. Although, this problem may be offset to some extent if domestic workers return to HE like Sylvester says.

I am planning to look for a commercial job, but this economic downturn I may end up taking a lecture/research jobs for the next few years. Yahoo News listed 10 jobs today that are insulated from the US economic downturn - teachers and nurses were listed - so I guess that can equally apply to HE educators.

It's a good time to have/ be studying for a PhD!

i agree with sylvester this is what i have heard too, recession makes people go back to school, though i am wondering who is paying for the tuition fee

Well all of these are very comforting thoughts (up) as I'd like to go into lecturing!

Perhaps the government would pump a lot of money into economics and criminology research.

Of course, during the actual Second World War when times were tight, there still had to be people doing 'pointless' things to keep morale up. I'm put in mind of the Entertainment Corps in It Ain't 'Alf 'Ot Mum.

Showing my age....

Apparently the recession of 1992 was bad; in fact I remember empty shelves in many of the local shops at that time. Being 16, my main annoyance was that I couldn't find any hair gel.

The government has already made drastic cuts in physics funding, but that was before any talk of recession. You would think recession would mean further cuts, but my economic knowledge hovers just above zero, so I don't really know.

This is the problem now - in the recession back in the 1990s UG education was free and PG education involved low fee (I think around 2,000 a degree). Now it's much more expensive. A one year course in London is at least over £5k now. I think people will be more prudent and won't be giving their cash away in tuition fees.

Well, if anything, the recession has probably stregthened the resolve of a lot of post-graduates i.e. there is no alternative so ya might as well put your heart and soul into your research! I don't think academia is as recession proof as we would like to believe and if anything, it is the first cost to be cut by many of the otherwise benevolent corporations and by whichever means possible. From what I can see, results nearly have to come out faster from projects and I would even reckon that there will be something of a ranking of PhD results in terms of future employment (ok, ok, I know generally a PhD is a PhD but they could be evaluated in terms of publications, etc.,).

But anyways, speaking of economic black holes, all this talk of recession will be worth nought once the boys and girls in CERN flick the switch in a weeks time ... there'll be the biggest bang since Will E. Coyote used that faulty ACME dynamite and a box of matches donated by that pesky Roadus Runnerus 8-)

Ah yes, forgot about THAT impending apocalypse... what the hell was I worrying about a recession for?

Ah well, it's been nice knowing y'all...
;-)