Don't Believe President Obama's Hype About An Engineer 'Shortage'

Forbes ^ | 09/15/2014 | John Tamny

[SeekAndFind]

[SNIP]

All of which brings us to the latest popular lament among pundits, politicians, and even some in the business world: the perceived lack of engineers and/or ‘STEM’ (science, technology, engineering, and mathematics) graduates. President Obama has said “We need more engineers,” so has Hillary Clinton, and then Lockheed Martin executive Stephanie Hill recently stated that “we’ll lose” if we don’t produce at least 1 million more ‘STEM’ grads.

About all the handwringing, readers can relax. Indeed, there’s nothing to this story or alleged shortage. Price signals work. They always do, and they do because one of the underlying purposes of markets is to fulfill unmet needs. We don’t need government or deep-thinking policy types to fix what is not a problem. The free markets already are as evidenced by the higher pay that engineers and other technical types can command in the marketplace.

Assuming the higher pay doesn’t cause more individuals to migrate toward STEM disciplines, that will merely serve as a signal for companies to apportion even more in the way of funds to the hiring of those who do. If market forces can turn million dollar computers into commodities that can be had for a few hundred, it’s very apparent that they can solve any presumed dearth of technical laborers. Important here is that innovations divined by the very engineers seen as too short in supply are rapidly negating the need for local talent as is.

Indeed, while Lockheed Martin’s Hill says “we’ll lose” if we don’t produce more STEM grads, companies like oDesk are rendering this imagined shortfall irrelevant. That’s the case because oDesk matches businesses around the world with engineers and computer programmers from around the world.

[SZonian]

I’m employed as an engineer, but I’m actually a technician with a title...I’m not “pedigreed” via a 4 year school. More like 20 years of hard knocks in the military.

I find it funny in a way that many employers think or believe that an Engineering Degree is essential for some jobs.

In fact, my discipline requires more analytical and critical thinking skills than anything 4 years of schools could provide.

The problem I see with many of these job postings is that they tend to dismiss or discount actual work experience and skills developled over time vs. a piece of sheepskin.

A bit of elitism as far as I’m concerned...