Mr. President, There Is No (US) Engineer Shortage

McGruber writes "Vivek Wadhwa has written an article in the Washington Post titled, 'Mr. President, there is no engineer shortage,' which addresses the perceived national shortage of engineers. Wadhwa slams China for its practice of applying the 'engineer' label to auto mechanics and technicians, yet fails to slam the U.S. for its practice of applying the 'engineer' label to sanitation workers, building janitors, boiler operators, FaceSpace coders, MSCEs and DeVry graduates. He also says, 'Some of [the U.S.'s] best engineers are not doing engineering, and some of its best potential engineers are not even studying engineering, leaving us short-changed in solving the important problems of the day.'"

NASA Engineers

[wideBlueSkies]

How many NASA guys are now pumping gas in Florida?

Lack of engineers, my ass.

Hey Mr President, we need jobs and stuff to be designed and built. Then you'll see the engineers get back on the grid.

Re:Shortage of engineering jobs,

[sandytaru]

From what I understand, the "off-shoring jobs" is a threat from Gibson, not the US government. Gibson has been asked to prove that the wood they source is environmentally harvested all the way to the source, and the US is charging that they knowingly purchased "tainted" wood from a seller that was illegally harvesting from Madagascar. Gibson contends the wood came from a legal sourcer in India. If Gibson has the paperwork that backs of their claim, the investigation is over. If Gibson doesn't have the paperwork, the investigation goes on. Gibson can threaten to offshore jobs all they want, but they'd lose their critical "Made in America" claim if they did.

Re:Shortage of engineering jobs,

[mikael]

Sounds crazy but it is documented:

Gibson Guitar Corp. Responds to Federal Raid [gibson.com]

âoeThe Federal Department of Justice in Washington, D.C. has suggested that the use of wood from India that is not finished by Indian workers is illegal, not because of U.S. law, but because it is the Justice Departmentâ(TM)s interpretation of a law in India. (If the same wood from the same tree was finished by Indian workers, the material would be legal.) This action was taken without the support and consent of the government in India.â
Gibson Guitar tangled in Madagascar wood law [ultimate-guitar.com]

Gibson has now become the first company in the world to be investigated, though not yet charged, with violating new provisions of a 100-year-old law called the Lacy Act. It says a plant can't be taken or a tree cut in another country against its own laws, and secondly, that illegal plant can't be taken into the United States.
  But was the wood found at Gibson cut or traded illegally?
  "Historically and currently, the laws of Madagascar have allowed for the exportation of ebony and rosewood in certain finished forms, fingerboards being one," said Bruce Mitchell, Gibson's attorney.
  Guitar components called fingerboards were taken in the raid. The inlay and fret lines were added in Nashville, but Gibson said even what appeared to be bare pieces were not unfinished.
  "Finished isn't an English dictionary term; it's a legal term in Madagascar. It's defined, and the law specifically defines a fingerboard blank as a finished good," said Juszkiewicz. "It's not illegal. It's not illegal under Madagascar law. You can't argue with the facts."

Re:Shortage of engineering jobs,

[dkleinsc]

I don't think iPad production is ruining Chinese workers lives. If it were (and I see no indication that it is) I would agree... we can get by without a widget that causes real suffering somewhere else.

Perhaps you might have seen this 2 days ago on Slashdot [slashdot.org]: "The report claims that over a 10-year period, 'many people have fallen sick, with a sharp increase in the village's cancer rates.'"

Re:Shortage of engineering jobs,

[Grishnakh]

Sorry, no. The DOJ filed court documents telling Gibson they need to offshore their jobs:

http://www.redstate.com/aglanon/2011/08/31/doj-advises-gibson-guitar-to-export-labor/ [redstate.com]

One possible reason:

http://amerpundit.com/2011/08/27/gibson-guitar-competitor-uses-the-same-wood-but-donates-to-democrats/ [amerpundit.com]

Re:Shortage of engineering jobs,

[PhrstBrn]

Actually, they're finding the opposite to be true, especially for large bulky products. A lot of manufacturing is being moved out of China. Companies are realizing two things

1) Shipping the product across the globe costs a lot of money. You can save money buy building near where you sell it
2) Labor costs are going up year after year, much faster than they are going up here in the US
3) Corruption in China is bad. Your cost savings start going out the window when you have to bribe the local protection racket (aka the local police)
4) Corruption in China is bad. Things can go "missing". Namely factory workers walking off with the goods and plans.
5) Corruption in China is bad. The factory next door has copied your product design and is now making knock off products. Patent protection? Copyright law? Go fuck yourself, you're in China.

So at first, the bean counters might think it's cheaper to manufacture in China, but after you count the beans, they're starting to realize the cost savings just aren't there after having to deal with all the new problems created by being in China. For smaller things, like small electronics, cheap toys, it's still cheaper in China, but larger, bulkier things, like planes, cars, they're all moving out. And companies who are sick and tired of their IP being stolen, they're moving out too.

As wages continue to go up, this trend is going to continue.