Introduction: Commercial Archaeology is in Trouble?Following the news, one would believe that commercial archaeology in the UK is in a crisis due to a lack of archaeologists, but is it?
All the articles base this belief, of a lack of archaeologists to handle projects, on the results from the 2016 report, National Infrastructure Development and Capacity 2015-33: An Assessment (NIDC). The NIDC report examined future infrastructure needs and estimated that there will be a ‘…shortage of between 25 and 64% in the available workforce needed to service the archaeological needs …’ (p.3).
There is a problem with the data that the NIDC used, which means there will not be such a significant increase in demand for archaeologists because of large infrastructure projects. This white paper explores that problem and examines if it is possible to predict future job demand in commercial archaeology.
