Eek! The Plummeting Philosophy Major in the U.S.

only 0.36% of Bachelor's recipients are philosophy majors, and 22% of all philosophy BAs are awarded by just 20 universities

Three years ago, I posted some optimistic reflections about how the philosophy major seemed to be recovering from its recent decline in the U.S. I take it back. The National Center for Education Statistics has released its numbers from the 2023-2024 academic year, and it’s bad.

First off: The humanities in general have been hemorrhaging majors since about 2008. English in particular has been hammered. In the 2000-2001 academic year, 4.5% bachelor’s degrees recipients were English majors. Now it’s 1.7%. [1]

[declining humanities majors]

Since philosophy started out low, its decline is not as visually evident in the graph. Here are the raw numbers.

Year: Philosophy BAs awarded (as a % of all Bachelor’s degrees)

2001: 5836 (.49%)
2002: 6529 (.52%)
2003: 7023 (.54%)
2004: 7707 (.57%)
2005: 8283 (.60%)
2006: 8532 (.60%)
2007: 8541 (.59%)
2008: 8778 (.59%)
2009: 8996 (.59%)
2010: 9268 (.59%)
2011: 9292 (.57%)
2012: 9362 (.56%)
2013: 9427 (.54%)
2014: 8820 (.49%)
2015: 8184 (.44%)
2016: 7489 (.40%)
2017: 7572 (.39%)
2018: 7667 (.39%)
2019: 8074 (.40%)
2020: 8209 (.40%)
2021: 8328 (.40%)
2022: 7958 (.39%)
2023: 7550 (.38%)
2024: 7091 (.36%)

As you can see, there were grounds for hope around 2019-2021. However, since 2021 the number of bachelor’s degree completions in philosophy has fallen from 8328 to 7091 -- a 15% decline in just three years. The percentage of college students receiving philosophy degrees is at an all-time low.

Bachelor’s degree completions in general have declined somewhat. They peaked at 2,068,932 in the 2020-2021 academic year and have declined slightly in every subsequent year, down to 1,959,325 for the 2023-2024 academic year -- a 5% decline overall. Possible explanations of this general trend include: a hangover from the pandemic, demographic shifts, or a decline in the perceived value of a university education.

I was curious whether the decline in philosophy majors would be more pronounced at schools with fewer philosophy majors. In a post from 2021, I had found that from 2010-2019, just 20 schools accounted for 17% of philosophy degrees awarded in the U.S. Returning to those same data for the 2023-2024 academic year, I found that the top 20 schools now account for 22% of all philosophy degrees awarded.

Another way to examine the increasing concentration is to check Carnegie classifications. Carnegie classifies undergraduate institutions as “selective” if they are in the 40th-80th percentile of selectivity in undergraduate admissions based on test scores, and “more selective” if they in the 80th-100th percentile of selectivity. Fifty-two percent of philosophy degree recipients are from “more selective” schools, compared to 25% of bachelor’s degree recipients overall; and 84% of philosophy degree recipients are from either selective or more selective schools, compared to 62% overall. In 2010-2019, 45% of philosophy BAs were from more selective schools (vs. 23% overall) and 80% were from either selective or more selective schools (vs. 60% overall), confirming the increasing concentration.

Thus, relatively elite schools award disproportionately many philosophy degrees -- and this tendency has increased as the percentage of students earning philosophy degrees has declined.

For those who are curious which universities awarded the most philosophy degrees in 2023-2024, according to the NCES IPEDS classifications, it is:

University of Pennsylvania 193
University of California-Los Angeles 117
University of California-Santa Barbara 93
University of California-Berkeley 91
University of Washington-Seattle Campus 88
University of Southern California 84
New York University 76
University of Maryland-College Park 75
University of Chicago 71
Boston College 71
University of Colorado Boulder 69
Boston University 67
Arizona State University Digital Immersion 65
University of Wisconsin-Madison 57
Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University 56
University of California-Davis 55
Emory University 55
Columbia University in the City of New York 53
University of Michigan-Ann Arbor 51
University of California-Santa Cruz 48
University of Florida 47
Arizona State University Campus Immersion 46
University of Pittsburgh-Pittsburgh Campus 46
The University of Texas at Austin 46

Note: Some of these numbers include interdisciplinary philosophy majors, such as Penn’s Philosophy, Politics & Economics major.

All of these universities except the two Arizona State universities are Carnegie classified as “more selective”.

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[1] Method: The NCES IPEDS databases, custom data files, EZ group U.S. only, completions by CIP number, including both first and second majors, CIP categories 16 for foreign language and literature, 23 for English, 54 for History, and 38.01 for Philosophy. Each year captures the academic year ending that spring. For example 2024 is the 2023-2024 academic year.