Letters to the Editor
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No Such Thing...
...as a shortage of engineers.
Funny how Microsoft, HP, IBM, and others are complaining of the so-called engineer shortage when they are the ones laying off by the droves. When our company advertised a vacancy for an engineer, we got over 300 resumes from experienced people; many out of work for 2-3 years. When I was getting laid off from HP, I had to train my replacements ... a couple of fellows from India (bright young guys, very nice, and CHEAP!).
The joke here in Silicon Valley is if you need a computer engineer, just call a cab. ( variations include "IT professional", "hardware engineer", etc.)
... and god help you if you are over fifty.
They are merely trying to keep wages down by flooding the market.
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There is no such thing as cheap labor--only value for money
I am surprised how American workers think only of their interests, simply overlooking the fact that there literally millions of jobs available for Americans in the US because of freer trade that helps US companies like Coke, Pepsi and General Motors make money. And free trade applies as much to labor as to goods or services. If you can shop in K-mart instead of Fifth Avenue, companies that buy labor can do the same with tech workers. US high-tech workers in the US must spend more of their spare time (now that they have a lot of that) learning about how the world economy works. If Microsoft is denied imported labor, somewhere, some politician in Asia will be thinking of throwing Pepsi out. It takes two to tango.
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You choose: Manager or Fry Cook
America has had amazing job growth in the past few years and I have to congratulate the corporations that are responsible. Never before have there been so many manufacturing jobs created in this country. It's only too bad that the "manufacturing" jobs are often line cooks at fast food restaurants. Thanks to the Bush administration's redefinition of "manufacturing" our economy looks better than ever.
Now, we're seeing the redefinition of "shortage of engineers." No longer does this mean that they can't find someone to work for them, it now means that they can't find someone who will work for them for slave wages with an indentured servitude contract. A worker on an H1-B visa is tied to the company that brought him over. It's extremely difficult to change jobs and the company can pull your visa for pretty much any reason they want.
So, what does this mean? It means that if you are an American, unless you are working for the defense industry which, for the most part, can't be offshored, you can either start a business or take a service job. Anything that doesn't require a physical presence in America, a corporation will offshore.
The only thing, unsurprisingly, that doesn't get offshored is the offshorers and the only thing that matters is the next bonus or stock option vesting.
So, Americans will be faced with a decision in the future: be an executive in a company or take a job in a service industry. There's very little middle ground that cannot be outsourced to India, China, Indonesia or whatever the next flavor of the month country will be.
I read a news story about a month ago that stated one of the reasons Lenovo purchased IBMs computer business was to get its management team. Effectively, Lenovo offshored its management to America. I guess it means we're still good with something.
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Myth
It's a myth taht this country has a shortage of enginneers of any kind the fact is we have a glut of engineers of all kinds. This is just another example of our government being paid off by international corporations at the expense of the people.
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A good or service is not the same thing as a person
JW,
anyone who equates a person with a good or servic (chattel) is talking about slavery, which supposedly was outlawed over 100 years ago.
Please speak to engineering students currently in college about their job prospects and the curriculums they study. I majored in electrical engineering. When it became time for me to graduate and to look for a job, imagine my surprise when I found last year's graduates at the job fair who still hadn't found a job. Well, I stand corrected, one of them was working at Lowe's and another was applying for a job as an airline steward. You think I'm kidding?
The only work I was offered were temporary IT helpdesk positions. These positions were all temporary because the companies later shipped these jobs overseas.
My brother was in the IT business for 5 years and had great experience. When he interviewed for this one particular position, there were over 400 applicants. He always makes it to the final cut of 20 but hasn't been able to find a job for the last 5 years. He eventually found part-time work as a dispatcher for the state troopers and as a PC technician at a hospital. So it isn't just IT workers over the age of 50 who are having a difficult time.
It's many people's belief that colleges and universities are lying to upcoming freshmen about the future of engineering and computer-related jobs. The staff at these schools are afraid of losing their own jobs so they don't warn the freshmen to major in something else, or even better: go out and get experience in your field before you commit 4 years of college tuition down the drain. If you want to be an electrical engineer, become an electrician or PC technician first. Then you will know the true state of affairs of the engineering world. Plus you will have something to fall back on.
I will say this. One of the reason why companies don't like to hire US engineering students is that cheating is widespread. It doesn't matter which college you attend. Strangely you will find that engineering students have different defintions of cheating; many of them believe that they are simply "helping" one another. (Cheating may be widepsread in Indian or Chinese schools, too, but I don't know.)
The professors also have very little interests in the students because they view the students as potential future competitors for their own jobs. So the professors actually don't want to teach students anything useful. I knew this one professor who was the "Intel" professor; he would kick students out if they came to his office. He always said, "It's all on the Internet or in the book."
Now my spouse who majored in chemical engineering fared much, much better. He found the dream job with a major chemical company. But he later found out that his position was previously held by two engineers with PhD's. So his company is saving $100,000 by hiring him. He's very glad now that he didn't go to grad school. Oh, yeah, his company is building new plants only in foreign places like Singapore. So if you're currently a chemical engineering student, please consider taking Chinese and don't go to grad school.
Alas, much of the stuff I've written here is already known to most engineers and programmers. The people who are being duped are the upcoming college graduates.