By Sharon Terlep / The Detroit News April 10, Pulse strong for pharmacy jobs Influx of new drugs and aging population means more druggists are needed.

Dilemma Finding enough druggists to dole out prescriptions is no longer the pharmaceutical field's biggest dilemma. The new quandary: Finding a place for swarms of aspiring pharmacists, many of whom are being turned away by pharmacy schools nationwide. A wide open job market and starting salaries that top $80, results of a critical shortage a few years ago -- have students lining up to dispense drugs. They also are attracted by a medical field without the on-call shifts of a doctor and an atmosphere mostly separated from patients.

Labor Market Features Median salary for a pharmacist is $92,964, according to mysalary.com. Druggists are needed to meet the demands of an aging population and an industry that's turning out record numbers of new drugs. Rite Aid Corp. will open four new stores this spring in southeast Michigan. Retail pharmacy sales nationally hit $221 billion in 2004, a 21 percent increase over 2002, according to the National Association of Chain Drug Stores. The demand for pharmacists in Michigan, on a scale of 1 to 5 with 5 being a severe shortage, is 3.60, according to a survey released by the drugstore association last week. That means there's some difficulty filling pharmacy positions.

That's better than five years ago, when the number of unfilled store pharmacist positions nationwide rose to nearly 7,000 from 2,700 in two years, according to the association. There were about 4,700 openings in Wayne State received more than 900 applications for 80 spots this fall in its four-year program to earn a doctorate in pharmacy science. Wayne State includes Oakland University students because of a recently formed partnership to train druggists. Classes won't get much bigger than that, in part because Metro Detroit lacks qualified pharmacies to train students. Students spend the last year of their education working in a pharmacy, and drugstores must meet certain criteria to qualify as a training site. Wayne State is working with area Kroger stores to help make their pharmacies fit for training students.

Economics We have supply and demand. Supply is pretty unresponsive to current wage (why?). wage Labor w0w0 L0L0 What happens when the demand  ? What goes up more, wage or labor force? Why? D S L1L1 w1w1