"He and His Forecast Were Typical of His Times"

"Known across academe as 'the Bowen Report,' the book became notorious for its Panglossian forecast of better times for academic job seekers. It soon symbolized the misguided optimism of a generation of would-be professors who kept waiting for their ship to come in, and eventually starved by the shore. Bowen's reasoning in the book wasn't overly complicated. He and Sosa argued that a coming increase in the number of college-bound students would soon necessitate the hiring of many more new professors. The authors forecast a faculty shortage, especially in the humanities and social sciences, where they said graduate-student enrollment levels were particularly unprepared to meet the coming influx.
"The Bowen Report proved persuasive, but it also proved wrong."

Leonard Cassuto at Vitae considers education scholar William G. Bowen.