Rethinking an engineer's education (Globalization? The plumber fears it not)

EE Times ^ | March 31, 2004 (2:33 PM EST) | Kenneth C. Smith

[BraveMan]

Kenneth C. Smith is professor emeritus of engineering at the University of Toronto (one of the "untouchables" in a globalized, outsourced world).

[BraveMan]

globalization ping . . .

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[vannrox]

AMEN. It's what many of us Technical Professionals have been trying to say for a while now. Engineers; Designers; Scientists; technical specialists are all being outsourced. The more money you command in the technical field, the greater the chances of you being outsourced. This is a very real and serious issue. As one thing that unites all of the above individuals.

They are all highly educated and skilled people who work in Manufacturing.

The solution to this problem, as specified above, is to follow the Rush Limbaugh solution. Exit your speciality and retrain yourself for a boring, but stable profession that won't be affected by outsourcing. The loss of our technical leadership is a matter for others to worry about. You have to concentrate on your own priorities and that of your family.

[lelio]

Bump for later reading.

[narby]

The "Outsourcing Problem" is one of the primary issues that Kerry hopes will get him elected.

Thanks for helping the Kerry campaign.

[navyblue]

I'm looking at the headline. (Globalization: The plumber fears it not.)

Maybe the plumber ought to be considering that "guest workers" can be plumbers?

Hmm! "Match any willing worker with any willing employer." I know somebody said that, but can't remember who.

[NHResident]

If you do a search - you should be able to find the average salary graph someone posted here that showed "Sanitation Engineers" make the highest average salaries of ALL engineers. "Sanitation Engineers" are the penultimate local engineer. "Sanitation Engineers" are more colloquially known as "Garbage Men" - you know the ones that show up once a week to remove your trash.

I think the Canadian Professor Emeritus is absolutely correct in his description of the problem for engineers. His solution is academic mumbo jumbo.

Not one of my children was encouraged to become an engineer. The writing on the wall of the 'internationalization' of US engineering was visible a LONG time ago.

[sonofron]

"If you do a search - you should be able to find the average salary graph someone posted here that showed "Sanitation Engineers" make the highest average salaries of ALL engineers. "Sanitation Engineers" are the penultimate local engineer. "Sanitation Engineers" are more colloquially known as "Garbage Men" - you know the ones that show up once a week to remove your trash. "

I would really like to see this graph. Are you telling me a garbage man makes more than 90k a year? Look here to see a survey done by the ppl at EE times:

http://www.eet.com/story/OEG20030828S0040

This is only the subribers to EE times I believe. Also you can check http://www.bls.gov for salary info on about 14 different engineering diciplines. See occupational handbook.

Also check here for a ranking of all occupations based on median salary:

http://www.acinet.org/acinet/select_occupation.asp?stfips=&next=occ_rep


Anyways, Engineering will continue to be a good paying profession, It just will shrink because of outsourcing, etc.

I'm an EE major and I know for a fact my business major friends take way lower starting pays and don't get as many job offers (don't get me started on my liberal arts major friends). Anyway, I would encourage my kids to go into the health professions first, then if it's not their cup of tea try engineering or law.

[Robert357]

As an engineer, I would both agree and disagree with the author. For many years, especially IEEE, has been bemoaning that there are too many engineers who are not doing professional engineering work.

I feel that IEEE was correct, and that many of the offshoring of "engineering" jobs are really jobs that are only partially "engineering." By that I mean that I as a consulting engineer (PE),I do not worry about my job being outsourced. The reason is that much of what I do is based on field troubleshooting, personal relationships with clients and then finding solutions to problems not symptoms.

The miriad of local code variations is such that no engineer in Russia or India could keep up with designing solutions to the NEC when most states and many cities have adopted their own slight variations. And while all utility power designs must conform to the NESC, just about every utility I work with has a slightly different approach to how they expect things to be designed.

Similarly, the variations in permitting are such and the need to design things so that they will not be stalled by permitting delays is such that my work will not be outsourced overseas. It is all I can do to keep up with local code and permit variations. An engineer who is struggling with English and trying to figure out codes and permit requirements from regulatory websites will be hopelessly lost.

In short, the majority of the engineering jobs I see being offshored, are in semi-professional roles and jobs that IEEE said long a go should not be performed by fully qualified engineers. Now the author is correct in that some highly qualified design jobs are being offshored for international products that are designed to international standards and international markets. But, I feel that is the minority of the jobs and that there is the potential for really talented engineers who really know what they are doing to do well in this country and not fear outsourcing. They just need to prove every day that they are a worth more than they cost and that they are make substantial contributions to a firm's profits. But that is true about every job today.

The Economy has changed from one where people put in their time at a job in exchange for money, to one where people must produce results that are profitable or else they don't have a job.

[AZLiberty]

Jobs are disappearing, more because of technology than because of offshoring. Human work, or rather human time -- spent at a desk, a lathe, a tractor, or a service counter -- is no longer the primary source of economic value. Most economic value is now created, by and large, by machines, either mechanical or electronic. People are still needed to guide the machines, but the machines do almost all the real "work".

This "problem" will only get worse as technology continues to advance. Eventually only a relative few of us will be needed to work. Granted, as the level of automation increases, products will get cheaper and cheaper so the need for money will decrease, but I predict that the availability of work will decline faster than price levels, producing a fundamental disconnect in the economy.

The odd thing is that wealth will continue to grow, at an accelerating rate, as innovation and automation continue. But working for a living will be an ineffective way of tapping that wealth. Only the owners of intellectual property and enterprises that exploit it will be in a position to make money.

So, what should one do to ensure of stream of income into old age? The best option -- as perhaps it always has been -- is to save and invest. Be part of the "Ownership Society" and capture the wealth that will almost automatically flow from almost inevitable improvements in efficiency and innovation.

[Baby Bear]

Bush said it and you forgot the sarcasm tag. :-)

[dr_who_2]

The electrical engineers should invent a more elegant way of handling drinking water and sewage so that the plumbers will fear something more terrible than globalization: technology.

[dr_who_2]

The electrical engineers should invent a more elegant way of processing drinking water and sewage so that the plumbers will fear something more terrible than globalization: technology.

[q_an_a]

I think you wrote a great post.

yesterday while watching the Antiques Raodshow, they interviewed a man who builds historical furniture. His work was brilliant and at least one "highboy" chest commands over $100,000.

There will be markets for people that provide unique things people want. I doubt that the service of companies that use engineers is anymore outstanding than the service at Home Depot or most stores, law firms etc. If we live in a serice socitey why can't you get any? So engineers that create or solve service problems will, like the hand crafted furniture maker, find a market and charge big dollars.

[plano29]

As an engineer and periodic attendee of the ISSCC conference the author of this article administers, I can say that the potential for globalizing engineering has existed for some time. Most engineering students in US universities are from foreign countries -- the concentration of which is higher in the graduate level. If you were to take a look a the proceedings of the ISSCC, you would see a ton of excellent papers submitted and presented by foreign engineers and researchers... so there is certainly good foreign talent to which to direct outsourcing.

The one thing that had prevented too much outsourcing in the past, however, was America's good business climate. A few years ago I was involved with a startup engineering company that consisted mostly of Japanese nationals. The reason why they came to America was because it was virtually impossible to obtain venture capital in Japan. The cultural climate in Japan also made it very difficult for a new company to aggressively pursue its hiring and development goals on a very short schedule. (Other over-regulated countries have similar issues with poor business climates).

What I find odd about outsourcing to India is that India has been known as a place where it is very difficult to start a business. My Indian friends tell me that one has to wade through a sea of red tape, filling out endless form and bribing countless officials before one can start a business there. My guess is that something must have fundamentally changed in India for it to have become an attractive venue for outsourcing. A friend of mine at Texas Instruments has told me that there are some projects in which half of the engineers on the project are working in India. Well... maybe its not surprising given that India provides a much better math education to their grade school students then is provided in most US public schools.

So, I think the best US solution to the issue would be to strive to create the best business climate possible. (It also wouldn't hurt if math and science ware taught by people who had a real background in math and science).

Until this happens, however, I will personally follow the Rush Limbaugh solution -- I start evening law school this fall.

[FastCoyote]

"The solution to this problem, as specified above, is to follow the Rush Limbaugh solution. Exit your speciality and retrain yourself for a boring, but stable profession that won't be affected by outsourcing. The loss of our technical leadership is a matter for others to worry about. You have to concentrate on your own priorities and that of your family. "

Well, that's what I've been doing as fast as I can. I don't want to add more to my technical skill base because of the diminishing returns problem - expertise is expensive and no one wants to pay for it. I think I'm going to start making Las Vegas dice clocks (actually, this isn't far from the truth).

[SuziQ]

We could use more plumbers. Sir SuziQ and I called 4 different plumbers 3 weeks ago and left messages that we were fixing to start a big remodel job, and wanted them to come price out parts of it. NONE have returned our calls! Must mean they have plenty of work and don't need ours.

It's all ok, though. We can do the rough plumbing, and let the plumber check it all and attach it to the city's water supply, and sewer, and to the Gas Meter.

[Sam the Sham]

The "Outsourcing Problem" is one of the primary issues that Kerry hopes will get him elected.

Thanks for helping the Kerry campaign.

You think unemployed high tech people won't notice if you don't mention it ? You think any high tech people these days feel particularly secure in their jobs ? You think that isn't on their minds ? You don't think there are a lot of 45-50 year old high tech people who stare at the ceiling at 3 am wondering what in God's name is going to happen to their lives and their families if they have to start over again at the bottom ?

But you're right. Maybe if we don't mention it no one will notice.

[lewislynn]

wanted them to come price out parts of it.

We can do the rough plumbing, and let the plumber check it all

If you can do the rough plumbing why do you need a plumber to check it?

That's why they haven't called back...They don't want to do the parts you don't want to do. They want to do the entire job...that's what they're in business to do.

It's not worth the headache of trying to work behind someone who likely doesn't know what they're doing, or come out and spend their time trying to explain to you what you did wrong, how YOU can fix it, the terminolgy and a materials list of the fittings you'll need to buy from someone else.