The rapidly shrinking number of American undergraduates signing up for computer degrees has prompted concern among high-tech companies that soon there won't be enough skilled workers to meet the demand.
New enrolment in North American computer science and engineering programmes has dropped for four straight years, falling 10 per cent during the 2003-04 school year, according to the Computing Research Association, a trade group for computer professors.
The trend is largely attributed to the dot-com bust and widespread worries about the accelerating pace of offshoring by high-technology employers.
The Washington-based group said the percentage of incoming undergraduates indicating that they would major in computer science declined by over 60 per cent between the Fall of 2000 and 2004, and is now 70 per cent lower than its peak in the early 1980s.
This phenomenon could lead to more offshoring, many feel. Many low-level programming jobs have already been sent to India and China. But high-level jobs combining technical and business skills are still in the United States.
However, "that could change if there is not enough workers to fill them," USA Today said.
"If we don't do anything, there are hundreds of thousands, nay, millions of Chinese, Indians, Slovaks, etc, that would love to have these jobs," Massachusetts Institute of Technology computer professor Jack Rockart, told the newspaper.
Shortages haven't been a problem yet. Tens of thousands of tech workers were laid off during the dot-com bust of 2000, and the market is still tight. But the pool of trained tech workers could become problematic in about four years, if computer graduates decline while the US tech industry grows.
Indeed, over the next decade, the Bureau of Labor Statistics sees the need for an additional 307,000 computer-software engineers, 184,000 systems analysts, 106,000 network-systems and data-communications analysts, and 103,000 managers.
The problem is serious enough for computer giant IBM to try to stop it. IBM is planning to give schools millions of dollars in software and offer the expertise of more than 1,000 staffers as part of a widespread college-support programme, USA Today said.
The computer company will also announce a partnership with University of Arkansas to create classes for students seeking tech jobs at Wal-Mart.