Where have all the engineers gone?? 17

[izax1]

I just found the following on CNN.

http://www.cnn.com/2010/LIVING/12/30/cb.popular.graduate.degrees/index.html?iref=obinsite

And I wonder: Why has the demand for engineers declined??

And I wonder because everymans demand for engineering gadgets are still present in an ever increasing complexity. (Computers, Kitchen utilities, TV and Home video etc) but I think the most demanding and most complex engineered utilities must be the "tools" we use to get as far as possible and as fast as possible from A to B. And at the same time without failure and accidents. We still need ever more advanced cars, trains, aeroplanes and ships. Wher to they come from if not from clever engineers? And you dont get from A to B with a computer if you do not have the car with and engine.
I am a mechanical (aerospace) engineer myself from Europe and love my job, and have been privileged with working with advanced automobiles, aeroplanes and spacecrafts. This survey from CNN is not unique, and not specific for the US. What will transport the dentists, the doctors, the accountants, the teachers, the politicians from A to B if there are no engineers to design and develop the transporters.

I just wonder?

 

[owg]

csd72 - Thanks for pointing out those pictures that match the job titles, very amusing. I sure would like to know about that mine. It does look like a ride in an amusement park. The rock face looks suspiciously like plaster.

HAZOP at

http://www.curryhydrocarbons.ca

 

[Twoballcane]

LOL yeah I agree. However, I'm sure they got them from some generic photo shop library somewhere on the web. I used a few of them for posters for some seminars that use to do. It's just random pics of people doing stuff.

Tobalcane
"If you avoid failure, you also avoid success."

 

[csd72]

Yes, but why are there not pictures of actual engineers in that photo library.

Is it a global conspiracy to keeep engineers down and..........sorry I was a bit late with my tablets!

 

[moltenmetal]

If there were photos of actual engineers out there, how would you know?

Perhaps close-ups of the working hands of some of the Canadian engineers might give a clue. But otherwise I don't think we have a distinctive "look", uniform or smell for that matter!

 

[cranky108]

If they took a picture of me this morning, it would look like some guy in an office talking on the phone.

Hardly sounds exciting.

After all they need to make a person want to sell themselves into this profession (or become a slave to it).

 

[redraidereng]

The decline in engineers is country specific. Places like Japan and India have very high enrollments.

In the U.S. the problem is two-fold: 1. Engineers don't self-promote and 2. Parents don't push their kids into engineering.

Engineers don't self-promote
I work in a large office with a lot of senior engineers. When they explain their jobs to other people they say things like "I work on a computer all day, or I stare at drawings all day". Instead they could say, " I analyze structures to make sure that they are safe for the public/can be built faster to save clients money/etc". You never hear stock broker or insurance agent describe their job as "staring at the computer", so why do engineers?

Parents don't encourage their kids into engineering
With all the senior engineers in my office, you would think that there would be a lot of their kids going into engineering. Quite the opposite. They encourage them away from it. Another example comes from a family member. My cousin started in engineering against the advice of his father. Eventually his father's pressure won out and my cousin switched to business.


I do think that this decline can be reversed. If engineers promoted their profession and communicated what they do, then the general public would have a greater appreciation for the profession. Start with your friends and family and be a little more descriptive in describing your job.

These are just my experiences and observations.

 

[cranky108]

Why promote the profession when truck drivers make an almost simular take home.

I can always say "I solve technical problems, that my coworkers can't figgure out". But I don't. It's easer to say "it dosen't matter, because I get free electricty" (and people believe it).

 

[izax1]

Yeah, point on redraidereng. My concern is: where are the decicion makers? People that can turn the current? Of course you can never force anyone into engineering (That would be a useless engineer)But it is possible to promote the need for engineers to make the society turn. (Ref my original post.)

 

[moltenmetal]

redraidereng: our profession may or may not need promotion, but what it does NOT need is recruitment! Many engineers confuse these two VERY different things.

What benefit would there POSSIBLY be to graduating even more engineers, such that only 1/4 of the grads end up working as engineers instead of the 1/3 of them who currently do?

Again, this isn't region- or discipline specific, but the general stats tell us that enrollments in engineering SHOULD decline, because our ability to generate engineering grads already outstrips the labour force demand for them by a WIDE margin. That may not be your personal experience, but it IS what the stats tell us.

 

[HornTootinEE]

Being recently out of college (4 yrs), and seeing stats that moltenmetal mentions, makes me think the problem is how engineering is billed by high school career/guidance counselors and college admin people. "Engineers make big money" Well, yeah, we make decent money. Better than most school teachers, janitors, warehouse people, etc. But do we make better money than most electricians, linemen, plumbers, HVAC techs, truck drivers? The answer is NO. Seems the only way to make the "big money" that these counselors talk about is to leverage your engineering degree to get into a management position at Company X, Y, or Z. Or work for 20 yrs for "the man" making your 2% increase a year and generating contacts until you can make a go on your own, then you work many, many, many hours for that pay day. Maybe my company is different, but I don't know a upper level manager that truly puts in more than 40 hrs. a week. The company "owns" them to some extent, so they may have to check email on vacation or make a decision on a weekend, but thats about it. My point being: most engineers (who are still engineers) that I know do it because they like the work and the technical problem solving, and they have found other ways to bring home more income if it is money they are looking for i.e. property rentals, etc. Only 1/3 of engineers work in the field because thats the only ones that truly went to school to be engineers and didn't probably have their sites set on being the CEO of their company, or some upper level money crunching puke that tells engineers they have to cheapen their product...

Hope I'm wrong with most of my statement, those of you who have moved into management, do you manage engineers or are you strictly a business manager? I see a HUGE difference in the two.

 

[cksh]

Trade workers making more money than an engineer is not always true. You need to compare years of xp, type of work, location, company, overtime etc.

I work in Automotive, and although there are line workers making more than me (My uncle made 100k+), their hourly rate is maxed, less than mine, and the only reason they make more is because of overtime. I surpassed their max hourly rate years ago and am only mid career.

Sure, there are many electricians, plumbers etc making much more because they get to keep what they charge, but they usually own their own company. And they didn't come right out of training making that money either. As with most careers they paid their dues.

Every Engineering field has different pay scales, but I don't know many other careers, short of medical or law, that pay what my coworkers got paid straight out of school. And my salary shows no signs of a cap.

I would never push somebody to become an engineer, or into any other field for that matter, but if they had the interest, I might encourage them.

 

[csd72]

The question is not whether an engineer makes more momey but do they make enough more money to justify the years out of the workforce and the education debt at the end. My feeling is that the answer is 'no' in the uk, the US and Australia.

Also comparing yourself to the average lineworker or truck driver really gives a skewed picture. If the average professional engineer was to spend 4 or 5 years dedicating their energy and intelligence into coming up with the best way of making money than they probably would be considerably better off than the average line worker or truck worker.

As for the comments regarding decision makers, I really think that we should be more outspoken about the lack of technical competence of the government and of people in the media.

When that architect said that the world trade centre would not have fallen down if it was made of reinforced concrete, where were the engineers telling him that he didnt know what he was talking about and he should leave those sorts of statements to those who do.

We need to make ourselves heard in the media.

 

[Twoballcane]

“But do we make better money than most electricians, linemen, plumbers, HVAC techs, truck drivers? The answer is NO.”


Hmmmm ok…from the United States Department of Labor (

http://www.bls.gov/oco/ooh_index.htm):

Plumbers (Building equipment contractors) $21.86/Hr ($45,469/Yr)

Electrician (Nonresidential building construction) $22.21/Hr ($46,197/Yr)

HVAC Techs (Building equipment contractors) $ 18.26/Hr ($37,981/Yr)

Median hourly wages of heavy truck and tractor-trailer drivers were $17.92/Hr ($37,274)

Ahhhhh… yes we do…

Mechanical Engineering $74,920/year, (I’m actually between the highest 25% and 10%) so the delta from say an electrician is $28,723 per year. Let’s say the same ratio over 40 years, so that is a delta of $1,149,000 by retirement. Not too bad.

Also new grad engineers start salaries rank the highest compared to other degrees:

http://www.cnbc.com/id/29408064?slide=2

Tobalcane
"If you avoid failure, you also avoid success."
“Luck is where preparation meets opportunity”

 

[cranky108]

Location, location, location. Many engineers who live in the midwest don't earn that much. Until I got out of that, I wasen't paid that much.

On the other hand, there are still places I could earn more, but I don't want to live there. So balance of location is the key to here.

But for so many unfilled positions, we are not seeing rising saleries, like you would see in other professions.

True so many grads don't stay in engineering, but how does that compare to other professions? But without experence why would anyone want to hire a grad? They want to grow an engineer (Which seems to be rare).

 

[FeX32]

As for hourly rates.
I made $36.50/hr as a teaching assistant at uni.


Fe

 

[HornTootinEE]

Twoball-

In reference to cranky, Location. I'm in the midwest, and in our state Electricians, Plumbers, Lineman, etc. make much higher than the median wage you have shown. So I guess my understanding is skewed. Thanks for the national average stats though, it's an interesting look.

 

[csd72]

Twoballcane,

You missed my point entirely on that one.

If you add up the cost of university to the salary you could potentially have been earning at that time you get about 70k a year. Over 4 years that gives you a total of about 240k that you are behind before you even start working.

It is a good ten years before you start getting anywhere near even with a salary in the upper quadrant. Those are the ten years when most people buy a house, start a family, contribute the most important part of their pension e.t.c. most of the most expensive things tend to happen in those years.

 

[HornTootinEE]

csd-

You are talking to exactly my perceptions... I know in my current situation, our Lineman average $72,000 per year. It will be at least another 3 yrs until I reach that level, on my current pace anyway at this company. I will be 7-8 years out of college, with a 4 yr degree that took me 5 yrs and a final school bill of roughly $60,000. So we're talking 12 yrs out of high school. Those guys had one year of school (post high school) with a bill of roughly $10,000 and had that $72,000 wage just 3 yrs after trade school when they reached journeyman status. So as you say, by age 30 I have the same wage they had at 23. And I got married, have a little one, bought a house, etc. I can tell you my house and vehicles are much more modest than several of the lineman, who happen to be 3-5 yrs younger than myself.

 

[owg]

MoltenMetal - Attached is the best I can do for an "engineer at work". This one is a chemical (process) engineer trying to figure out how to get oil out of sand. Note the oil sands mine face in the background.

HAZOP at www.curryhydrocarbons.ca

 

[Twoballcane]

csd72, so $1,149,000 - $240,000 = 909,000 left, still not too bad and you still have all of your body parts. However, lets speak in averages. Other factors that other people may be doing better (or worst) is that person’s own doing (i.e overtime, initiative, economy…etc). So please supply data that shows your argument, if not, it is just hearsay. Please do not take my statements being mean, I guess my writing style on this board come from my NYC roots.

However, in my case, I went to a public college and today's tuition is around $3,000 per semester (and yes it is an ABET school, with a Bachelors in Engineering to boot). When I graduated back in 1995 it was $700 per semester. It was a commuting college too so I stayed with my parents. I do have to say it took me about 12 years after graduating to break the six figure mark. I do have alums in my company who are doing much better than I and one day hope to reach their level of pay and especially engineering prowess.



Tobalcane
"If you avoid failure, you also avoid success."
“Luck is where preparation meets opportunity”