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Engineering Careers Short-Circuiting
8BitWimp writes "Today's edition of the Christian Science Monitor has an interesting article discussing the current plight of the U.S. engineering profession. One 29-year-old engineer recently caught in Nortel Network's layoffs said "I spent seven years in school, and it resulted in a six-year career." The article goes on to say a California computer science professor has statistics to show that a programmer's career is not much longer than a pro-football player. What do other Slash-Dot readers think of this situation as related to their programming and engineering careers? Would you pursue the same career path again?"
People who drive trains are often referred to as "engineers". Got it now?
I can't wait until we just get rid of all the countries and start cooperating
heh, you're serious? competition is the reason we exist and continue to thrive. the trick is to keep it friendly competition. without competition, innovation becomes impossible.
We ARE supposed to be modern and civilized, aren't we?
whatever gave you that silly idea? just saying that we're civilised is hardly going to undo billions of years of hardwired behaviour.
heh, was it star trek that brought this idea of civilised humanity being ruled by a single government? dunno, but I'd say we have a long way to go before that pipedream is ever realised. for the most part, we 'civilised' people are in the minority, so if we were to try to put representative or direct democracy into the picture... just imagine the nightmare.
oh well, all hail whatever god the government decides on.
One big nation isn't really the solution.
Just look at America itself. We are "one nation", but we are "seperate states". That is what a world nation would become. One big "governing body" with continent based "sub governing bodies".
How is that different from what we have right now? There would still be border disputes. There would still be trade wars and heavy competition.
Nothing would change by shifting borders.
The thing is, we are talking about a world economy here, not just America's. America is making use of off short workers which results in their own workers seeking different employment. At the same time, American companies feel they are driven to this need to use off-shore workers because the competition is steep and any advantage would help their business stay afloat or move forward.
We as consumers demand lower prices for everything and we demand more for our money.
In short, we create our own spiral of economic decline. We are stuck in a catch-22.
To improve, people must be willing to buy more expensive items and pay more for less.
Companies must be willing to shoulder the costs and overhead and hire locals as opposed to off-shore workers.
All levels need to be addressed. Simply cutting corners at one level or asking people pay more without all sides doing their parts only speeds up the spiral.
It is hard to do and with the way businesses are leaning these days, it will be a long few years, if not decades, before we're "really" out of it.
Winged Power Photography
I'm sorry but this attitude exemplifies something that is wrong with engineering culture. People are not born to anything except a slap on the ass and even that is dependent on a your health care plan.
An appreciation of and a desire to participate in science and engineering often comes from the encouragement of others during one's education and subsequent career. Moreover, nothing in the article indicates that a passion for engineering will save you from a volatile job market. As people who work in these fields our focus should not be on the smug satisfaction that the pretenders are being ousted, but that people who want to innovate are not finding it economically feasible to do so.
Usually those who are passionate about something encourage others to be interested in it as well. Yet, like yourself, some feel that a particular field is 'theirs' and others are unworthy or unqualified for some reason or other. This is not a way to grow an industry or a field.
-A
"The plural of anecdote is not data." -- Roger Brinner
Unions will just bring business down, that's all.
Though, it's tough to be without a job, but if there are no business, there would be no job too.
The law of supply and demand, as long as you mentioned it, will straighten everything out.
There are no place for unions there, though.