More employment opportunities for engineers? 5

[cotelecom]

Just curious, but do people feel like the job outlook for engineers is improving with the larger economy? We've technically been in a recovery for a while now, but the engineering jobs being advertised seem few and far between, if there are any at all. Am I missing something, or is this a jobless recovery for engineers as well? The only jobs I see being advertised are so specific with their requirements that over 90% of the engineers that apply probably aren't considered qualified. Your thoughts?

 

[davefitz]

back to the original post.

some well established industries have greyed-out , and are filled with baby boomers ready to retire and to be replaced by a new crop. Electric power generation ( electric utilities and their suppliers of boilers, turbines, etc) is one such industry ready for complete regeneration. Nuclear power industries ( and its gov't regulators ) as well.

A recent US law passsed 2 weeks ago may accelerate early reitirement, to make room for the next generation- gov't to pay for the health benefits of those early retirees ( 55-64 yrs old) that make way for the next gen.

 

[moltenmetal]

atlengpe- your prediction that "environmental and water/wastewater treatment technologies will boom" was on the lips of everybody 20 years ago when I graduated. I spent 5 years inventing new treatment technologies and STARVING in these pseudo-industries- before I voted with my feet.

An industry only exists when it has a true value proposition, not just an imagined one based on people's wishful thinking! And innovation is only useful in a business sense when it solves problems in such a way to generate a value proposition.

Environmental and water/wastewater technologies will only boom when we make water and waste disposal more expensive. The market is incapable of making that happen on its own- governments need to intervene with regulation and taxation. 20 years into my career I'm still waiting for this to happen, but I've long ago stopped holding my breath.

My suggestion to young engineers is to not buy the hype about ANY "up and coming" industry. Engineers wishing to remain employed as engineers should pick a discipline based on what fascinates them most, then build good generalist skills in that discipline. Engineers wishing to be compensated properly for their efforts should go into business for themselves or with partners, when and to the extent that is possible in one's specialty- preferrably capturing more of the value chain rather than settling for hourly fees alone. Engineers unable to remain employed or in business should leave the profession. And engineers should stop flogging the profession of engineering to kids as if it were "the next big thing"- that advice is at least 60 years out of date. 2/3s of people with engineering degrees in Canada have jobs not associated with engineering. I don't see any likelihood of that situation improving any time soon. That doesn't make an engineering education a waste of time- no education is a waste of time if you're of the right mindset. But an engineering education is no longer professional training (ie. with a high probability of leading to a job IN the profession) in the same way that medical school is.

 

[TJOrlowski]

An industry only exists when it has a true value proposition

Or when the government subsidizes an industry on the backs of taxpayers.

-TJ Orlowski

 

[cotelecom]

Thanks Moltenmetal, that was probably one of the best responses on here so far.

In lieu of Atlengpe's postings, apparently we all need to start adapting to and planning for future engineering careers, rather than waiting around for our old silver platter jobs to come back that have forever gone with the wind.

So, with that in mind, maybe we should change the direction of this discussion, more along the lines of what engineering careers look the most promising over the next decade. The most obvious reference would be the BLS's growth projections through 2018:

http://www.bls.gov/oco/ocos027.htm

Some of their projections are quite surprising, and probably debatable. But how they come to these growth estimates is anyone's guess.

Here's a few examples of their assumed growth rates:

Biomedical engineering - 72%
Chemical engineering - 2%
Civil engineering - 24%
Computer engineering - 4%
Electrical engineering - 2%
Environmental engineering - 31%
Mechanical engineering - 6%
Petroleum engineering - 18%

So, some engineering disciplines will experience growth far above average, while others will grow less than nearly every other industry. Would anyone like to dispute these numbers or add some more insight into where these BLS projections come from?

I for one don't believe environmental engineering will ever experience a growth rate of 31%. Unless local counties start building water/waste water treatment plants in every single neighborhood (but everyone in this country already has access to clean water), and companies start polluting heavily again, how could we possibly need that many environmental engineers? This career was being flogged as the 'next big thing' while I was in college ten years ago, as it was 20 years as Moltenmetal can attest to. Yet it still isn't!

And how many people are going to pursue an MS/PhD in biomedical engineering for only $77K per year? That too doesn't seem very realistic.....

Your thoughts on the matter?

 

[KENAT]

One of the problem is that the terms used above overlap and don't necessarily mean the same thing to all folks or directly correspond to a common degree type etc.

Lots of mechanical & electrical engineers will work in Biomedical fields without specialist bio mechanical degrees.

My job, or at least my employers market, overlaps hi tech nanotechnology and biomedical.

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(probably not aimed specifically at you)
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[atlengpe]

Those numbers all look reasonable not withstanding special events like presidential orders/subsidies/disasters/etc.. The civil/env. engineering disciplines are right on par with the population growth of the past decade.

The population of most metro areas grew by around that much, so really 30% is not high at all for me.

All those numbers look like they represent what would happen if bush had 4 terms.

 

[cranky108]

If you work in a profession you love, you will never have to work a day in your life.

But within any profession there are many avenues that can be choosen.

 

[cotelecom]

Atlengpe, I'd love to know where you get your 30% growth rates from. The BLS growth rates in question are through 2018. However, the US population is only set to increase by about 10% per decade. So, I'm not sure where you'd get 30% projected growth rate for metro areas......

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demographics_of_the_United_States

http://www.censusscope.org/us/chart_popl.html

 

[cranky108]

Thinking through some drawings I was reviewing for a water plant. And I can't believe these numbers because of the premise of growing need for waste water plants.

Water engineers just don't seem to do so well in the electrical area. Or at least the drawings I've seen don't reflect that.

 

[moltenmetal]

Biomedical engineering is a niche market. It may grow a lot, but that will still provide employment for precious few engineers.

My university has canned the environmental/chemical engineering program it offered for the past 10+ years because of lack of marketplace interest in the graduates. An environmental/civil program is still offered.

I don't see any engineering discipline growing in the developed world beyond a small multiple of base economic growth. International trade in services is growing in a huge way, and the lure of lower cost labour markets will be enormous.

 

[atlengpe]

cotelecom, I'm just here to talk about what I know about the industry I work in and communicate this to you in plain English. Feel free to ignore me if you would rather talk about statistics.

I can't speak for other engineers, but for civil engineers, I would expect that many graduates are moving to growing cities like Atlanta, Austin, Raleigh, Seattle, Minneapolis, etc. for civil engineering jobs in the development industry. All these towns above are I believe in the top 10 for growth. Atlanta grew 30% and Raleigh did better at 42%. I would imagine that many civil engineers already left many rustbelt cities a decade ago.

Then you have the more specialized civil engineers working on more complex large-scale government projects in all the big cities like Boston, Miami, LA, Seattle etc. etc. and they are usually working for large international companies with big pockets and political power.

There are so many niches, levels, project types, and complexities in this profession, I think that you should assume that I'm going to have a limited viewpoint based on my particular niche.

It seems like you are just trying to have a very generalized discussion here? If so, I apologize for wasting your time. It seems to me like this forum is more valuable if people are more specific about their niches and try and find other with the same background, if you want any good responses.

 

[LSpark]

I'm an electrical engineer with a large utility in the UK and the outlook is very uncertain at the moment. We're in the middle of a major redundancy consultation as a lot of major outages and new projects have been cancelled/deferred. So the next couple of years are going to be a rough ride. Most of the most experienced engineers are likely to go leaving the mid-level engineers to train the graduates.

Looking ahead 5 years and I think there will be a shortage of experienced electrical engineers in the UK.

 

[Enterra]

The Federal Reserve Regional Banks have reported an increase in manufacturing activity in the central states. They also reported that states that were affected the worse by the housing bust are still having trouble and some states are even in danger of going back into a recession (eg. Nevada). We are recovering piecemeal, and it is very slow. The recovery will be fueled by demand, both consumer and industrial, from Asian countries. If you want to work on military, industrial or consumer electronics design; your best bet is to relocate to another country. On the other hand if you want to work on technical or industrial systems or technical or industrial projects/processes; I believe there is still a need for that type of engineering here in America. There is plenty of traditional civil and environmental engineering work in other countries where the government has money to fund such projects. I don't see that kind of work coming here soon. One thing that has failed to be mentioned here is that environmental engineering encompasses a whole lot more than building water and sewage plants. In the future it is going to encompass doing air and water quality testing when the carbon tax goes into effect. Not only governments, but every company will need to have a team of environmental engineers on their staff to calculate, reduce, and trade their carbon emissions. In summation, I agree with those who think that engineering as we have known it here in America is pretty much dead and therefore there is no use in students going into the traditional 5 core engineering disciplines expecting to land a job in engineering in the US once they graduate. Many of our university's curriculums are severely outdated and the top ones (MIT, Georgia Tech) are struggling to keep their curriculums up to date and their students employed. Which brings to mind another burgeoning field being taught in Engineering Colleges not mentioned in the BLS study, Financial Engineering.

 

[davefitz]

Well, I see a lot of potential to employ more new engineers in some industries. First, to offset the increased retirements of baby boomers there will be a lot new slots to fill, and these are not counted in the gov't statistics for "growth" .

Second, there are new technologies that are being implemented and generally better addressed by newly educated engineers. Much of it is driven by the need to reduce the consumption of fossil based fuels.

For example, the replacement of all conventional concrete components ( portland cement based) with geopolymer based concrete ( using flyash + lye in lieu of portland cement) would require a whole retooling of that industry. A surge in the developement of nuclear power plants is another field that is woefully short of fresh blood .

Water treatment to address the huge developing issue of groundwater pollution, both from hydro fracture drilling of nat gas, as well ans newly recognized pollution from conventional sources ( made visible by improvements in monitorign instrumentation).

 

[cksh]

I am an automotive engineer in Michigan, and although the engineering jobs have been slowly disappearing for longer than I have been here (1994), there are still jobs and companies are hiring. Sure, it is no where near as easy to find a job, but I have been able to jump ship 7 times, and have never been without one. As with any industry, you need to keep your skills, experience, contacts etc up to date.

I still get constant calls from out of state head hunters trying to get me to move.

There are few carees out there that are still golden (lots of opportunities/has a great outlook). I can't think of any at the moment. Even health care has its issues.

 

[windsoreng]

cksh, I work in automotve industry too.

Its really bad out there, would professional designation help me ?

Lot of my buddies say that pursuing designation wouldn't make a difference in automotive.

 

[GregLocock]

I agree with your buddies. So far as I can tell my career would not have been affected one iota if I had not been a member of a professional organisation, and I would be 10000 dollars richer.

Cheers

Greg Locock


New here? Try reading these, they might help FAQ731-376

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[KENAT]

I won't say it would never be of benefit, however, in exempt industry most of the time its benefit is very limited.

Posting guidelines faq731-376

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(probably not aimed specifically at you)
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[cranky108]

With the devalueing of the dollar, is anyone really going to be better off? Or will we just have a fist full of worthless paper?

I'm more concerned about the slide in our life style. If we keep shiping our manufacturing jobs over there, then that is where our money will go. However I honestly can't buy the products from a company that throws the stock holders under a bridge, and takes goverment money.

So I believe some engineering jobs, like automotive, is in a bad place.

 

[GregLocock]

Interested to hear why you think a strong dollar is a good idea if you are trying to retain exporting industries in your country. Personally I regard a strong currency as a blight. I mean it is quite funny that my pay in US dollars has increased by 50% in 3 years, but in practice there are very few advantages, and the destruction of our export industries is of far greater concern.

Cheers

Greg Locock


New here? Try reading these, they might help FAQ731-376

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