[Excerpt] I will argue today that a combination of short- and longer-run economic and political forces pose a threat to the well-being of our nation’s doctoral programs. After briefly touching on the impact of our current economic problems on doctoral education at private universities, I will in turn discuss the growing pressure on academia to expand access to and improve persistence in undergraduate education, the financial problems facing public research universities, the changing nature of faculty positions in academia and the implications of all of these forces for financing and restructuring doctoral education in the future.