Biopharmaceutical Research Jobs
Biopharmaceutical Research Jobs Backgrounder
It’s no secret that the last few years have been particularly hard on American workers, and the biopharmaceutical research sector has not been immune to the cutbacks that have plagued our country’s economy. Each time we say goodbye to friends and colleagues who have lost their jobs, we remember once again how lucky we are.
The fact is, tens of thousands of biopharmaceutical sector employees have been laid off each year since 2007, and it hasn’t gone unnoticed. The Wall Street Journal wrote, “The entire drug industry has been tightening its belt and cutting staff.”
Now, experts say the economy is beginning to rebound, and hopefully we will start to feel the effects of that soon. However, challenges remain, whether they are economic, regulatory or legislative.
As we focus not just on protecting our jobs, but also on growing them, it is important for us to keep in mind the effect that we have across America’s economy. Quite simply, every job that is protected within the biopharmaceutical research sector has a ripple effect that supports other jobs. After all, we are not just part of an industry, we are each a part of a community.
An impact on our economy
We don’t know for sure how many people within the biopharmaceutical sector have lost their jobs in recent years. However, even allowing for large loss of jobs, the industry presence in America is large. According to a recent study conducted by Archstone Consulting, almost 700,000 Americans were employed in the sector in 2006, the most recent year that data were available.
To put it into context, that figure represents an annual growth rate of 3.1% since 1996 - more than twice the annual growth rate for the rest of the economy, which was 1.4% for the same time period. In other words, even though our industry has been hit hard by the economic challenges of the past few years, we have shown a capacity for remarkable growth in the past.
However, these impressive numbers only tell a small part of the story.
The fact is, the effect of the biopharmaceutical research sector is much bigger than these numbers show. According to the study by Archstone Consulting, every direct job - defined as an immediate employee of a biopharmaceutical company - supports an additional 3.7 jobs in other sectors, with a total of 3.2 million jobs supported across America.
How is this possible? First, in addition to the nearly 700,000 direct jobs, there were just over one million indirect biopharmaceutical employees. These are people who don’t work directly for a biopharmaceutical company, but whose services are necessary to the company. This could be an accounting firm or a research organization. Many of these people may work with us on a daily basis under a contract with our employers. And while they may not be our immediate colleagues, our employment is clearly intertwined with theirs.
The other 1.5 million employees whose jobs are supported by the biopharmaceutical research sector have what are called “induced jobs.” They don’t work for a biopharmaceutical company, nor do they work indirectly with a biopharmaceutical company, but their jobs are supported by the spending habits of us direct and indirect employees. This could include a day care center that is primarily used by children of biopharmaceutical employees or a catering firm that is often brought in to provide food for lunch meetings at a biopharmaceutical company.
It may be hard to see how those spending effects could truly support other businesses the way that the numbers suggest. However, last year, Bloomberg News, which covers business and the economy, wrote about the town of Madison, N.J., where small business owners were concerned about the potential for a biopharmaceutical facility closure.
The town had already seen a slow-down from the anticipated job losses. A jewelry store owner “said his jewelry sales fell by a third in December from a year earlier, and more customers want to sell him old gold watches, chains and bracelets. [A deli owner] estimated his corporate catering business fell 40 percent last year.”
The article added that the facility’s workers “sustain Madison retailers, including business-card printers, law offices and sandwich shops, said Maggie Peters, executive director of the Economic Development Corporation in Morris County.”
We know the role that our jobs play in our own lives, and we know how our families depend on our jobs. But the study by Archstone Consulting makes clear that our jobs have an even broader effect on our communities.
An impact on our health
As we work together to preserve our jobs, and look toward rebuilding the biopharmaceutical research sector in the future, let us not forget the main effect of each one of our jobs - the hope for potential cures.
More than 2,100 new medicines are currently in development, and the average new medicine approved by the Food and Drug Administration comes at a cost of $1.2 billion over 10 to 15 years. These may be familiar figures for us. But there’s another way of looking at this commitment to research and development that really drives the point home.
According to Archstone Consulting, in 2006, America’s biopharmaceutical companies invested an average of $65,381 per direct employee on research conducted in the U.S. That is roughly eight times the average R&D spending per employee in all manufacturing industries.
From an economic standpoint, that is a remarkable number. After all, because of the ripple effect, that R&D spending leads to other spending, boosting the economy all around.
But for patients who are waiting anxiously for a new medicine to beat their disease, it means we’re trying eight times harder to find them a new treatment.
Not all of us are researchers. In fact, more than 75% of us work in departments outside of the life sciences, such as administrative support, engineering, production, and business operations. However, we all operate under a shared commitment to the final product - a safe, effective new medicine that will give hope, and hopefully health, to the patients who need it. We should all take pride in our jobs, not only because of the good that they do our family, and not just because of the good that they do for our communities, but because in the end, each one of us has a hand in someone else’s future.