In today’s job market, there is a gap between supply and demand for STEM profiles. The demand from companies for competent profiles in the scientific/technological areas, in fact, far exceeds the supply. This is because technology, nowadays, develops at exponential speeds and the education system cannot keep up with this speed.
This problem is also due to the persistent gender gap – that is, the difference between men and women – which is still very evident in this field. A low number of women in STEM subjects means that there is a low number of people specialized in these subjects. Let’s see in this article what the data tells us and what the reasons behind these problems are.
In STEM areas, demand exceeds supply
According to the World Economic Forum’s Jobs of the Future report, 65% of today’s children will be working in jobs that don’t yet exist. In short, the digital transition is changing the way we work, and the demand for competent profiles in scientific areas is increasingly high.
According to the latest study by the Digital Skills Observatory of the National Association of ICT Companies, i.e. Information Technology, the supply of jobs in the IT and technological field is approximately double compared to the professionals available in this sector. This means that the demand for digital skills is growing at a much higher rate than the supply, i.e. compared to the ability of the Italian training system to churn out new qualified profiles.
And here something very important must be said: the demand for STEM profiles is not so high just because the study trains us from a practical point of view. We must understand that studying scientific subjects gives us something very precise: the ability to reason and understand complex topics even if they are outside our skills. Studying science opens the mind to challenges, stimulates creative thinking, because its great objective is to find solutions.
This is why the market requires a large number of scientific and technological profiles, but not enough students choose this path. And here we come to the statistics: how many students choose STEM subjects?
Why don’t students choose scientific studies if the job demand is so high?
According to data from the Ministry of University and Research in the 2024/2025 academic year, those enrolled in STEM subjects were 28% of the total, a figure in line with recent years in which the data remained around 30%. And in itself, this is not a low percentage of students enrolled in scientific-technological subjects, it is in line with the European average. This is a low number of members if we compare it with the demand on the labor market.
The curve of those enrolled in STEM subjects, in fact, should grow over time with the growth of job positions which are increasingly greater in the scientific-technological field.
But why is it that if there is so much work in the scientific field, the number of students in this field is not increasing? The answer comes from the Almalaurea 2025 survey, which shows that students tend to choose the degree course more for personal and cultural reasons, and less for reasons linked to the job offer.
In short, to bridge this gap between supply and demand, what must be done is to promote, raise awareness and stimulate interest in scientific subjects which – culturally – are considered more difficult and less accessible, especially for girls.
The gender gap in STEM: statistics and origin of the problem
An important premise must be made here: science has no gender. Anyone can study it. Yet the data still tells us about a gap, a difference between men and women that has roots in the past.
In 2025, women represented the majority of total university enrollments with a percentage of 56.7%. What is worrying is that of these female students, only 19.8% decided to pursue a STEM career. In fact, if we take the total number of “scientific” students, we see that approximately 63% are male and 37% female.
It means that almost 2 out of 3 students are men and only a third are women. It must be said, however, that the gap is narrowing, albeit very slowly.
But why do women tend to choose degrees in technical-scientific fields less? It is not easy to identify a single motivation, it is a set of socio-cultural factors that for centuries have influenced and influence our way of thinking and seeing the world around us.
The difference in childhood experience
A first important point can, for example, be sought in childhood: the education and games that boys and girls are subjected to are still different, and this profoundly influences the mindset of an individual, from an early age. In fact, male children tend to play more team sports, have fun with more logical games, such as playing cards, constructions, or even war and strategy games, while girls are often subjected to more social games, such as dolls or characters that interact with each other, play with fake kitchens or fake chests, or create accessories such as bracelets or necklaces. Clearly, things are changing today, but they have been like this for a long time and still partially are. The fact that children play more logical games could be a factor that pushes future university students towards more scientific subjects.
The problem of reference models
The problem of role models must also be considered: for many years, there were few examples of successful women in science. Although things are changing today, the history of women in science has been long and tortuous.
Today, fortunately, things have changed and women have more space in the sciences, but we must keep in mind that for many years the presence of women was an exception. And the lack of role models to follow strongly marks the will of young women who, not seeing themselves recognized in these subjects, will not then undertake the path of science. The stereotype that science or technological subjects are something masculine can be very discouraging, even today when things are actually changing. Especially if career prospects are limited.
The invisible barrier of Glass Ceiling
In many fields the so-called Glass Ceiling is still present, that invisible barrier that still prevents women from accessing top positions due to obstacles that are often difficult to identify and for this reason they are metaphorically called “glass obstacles”. Look at this graph: it shows how within the academic environment, as the academic rank increases, the percentage of women decreases, going from 40% of female graduates to only 24% of full professors.
The fact that the presence of women in the sciences is low is not only a gender and cultural problem, but is also an economic issue with a strong impact for our country.
Being able to direct women, but also men, towards the sciences would lead to a greater workforce and the discovery of talent in an increasingly expanding field. As we have already said, the demand for professionals in this sector is very high, and being able to fill it is a great factor in economic growth for Italy.
