Ted Re...It must have seemed like ten but it was only two
Not according to this article.
http://www.eetimes.com/salarysurvey/career/career.html
ot so long ago-say, 1992-engineers emphatically, decisively, derisively knocked down any suggestion of an engineering shortage. "It is preposterous that amidst massive layoffs of engineers, the NSF [National Science Foundation] still projects an 'engineer shortage,'" one Californian wrote in 1992. He had plenty of company. That year, 87 percent of EEs and their bosses responding to our survey slammed the idea of shortages. With good reason. "Downsizing" became the management buzzword of the early '90s. EE unemployment touched
6 percent, a record high in this usually stable profession. Five years later, after a steady rise that began with the economic recovery in 1993-94, half the readership (50.5 percent) now admits: Yes, there's a shortage of engineers. Our non-scientific, Web-based "Salary Survey Opinion Poll" of 98 respondents was even more emphatic: 73 people declared a shortage; 21 said no. That's a major concession. Never, in the 20 -plus years we've been doing the "Worldwide Salary Opinion Survey" have U.S. engineers acknowledged there might not be enough of themselves to go around. They were mostly right through the 1970s and '80s, as bad years offset good ones for engineering employment. One misstep by an industry segment such as defense electronics or semiconductors, and out went thousands of engineers. Thousands of EEs immigrated from India and Asia, adding to the pool.
More readers, however, are now buying into the idea that perhaps we're entering an entirely new phase of engineering employment-at least for such widely used technical personnel as software engineers, who can be found in virtually every industry segment.
You will note that there were sporadic shortages in the 70s and 80s, but this on started after the downsizings of 92 and lasts until today.
I doubt if he would get laid off, however new employees would be rare and it could get tough to get raises. |
