Postgraduate research degrees - Master’s and doctorates - are designed to build a nation’s intellectual capital. Unlike undergraduate programs that focus on professional skills, research degrees exist to cultivate critical thinkers.
In Pakistan, however, this vision has collided with economic stagnation. Facing a job market starved of opportunities, unemployed graduates increasingly turn to postgraduate degrees not out of research passion, but as a default holding pattern.
Lacking options in the formal economy, pursuing an MS or PhD has become the ultimate alternative — a way to delay unemployment, boost social standing, or secure incremental pay bumps in existing jobs. Universities, driven by tuition revenue and quantitative targets, have accommodated this shift.
The consequence is a surge of under-prepared doctoral holders whose foundational research capabilities are sometimes lower than those of motivated high school graduates. This compromises the next generation. Because non-academic industries cannot absorb these graduates, the university system itself becomes their primary employer.
Unqualified scholars are hired as faculty. A self-reinforcing cycle of learning poverty takes root: educators with weak intellectual foundations train the next generation, exponentially degrading academic standards across decades. Breaking this cycle requires fundamental reform.
Academic hiring must prioritise demonstrated analytical output and teaching ability over paper credentials alone.
Naseem Haider, Karachi
Copyright Business Recorder, 2026
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