I don’t believe engineering as a whole is cyclical. Certain industries are cyclical. Most are no more cyclical than the economy as a whole.
@Chardo, it depends on what they are testing and within what industry.
The reality is that people with engineering degrees are hired for all kinds of jobs that require a quantitative background – including investment banking, data analytics and research analyst. Even if there are no engineering jobs to be had, there will be lots of employers eager to hire you with an engineering degree. Just go type in any job board like Indeed the search term “quantitative” and you’ll see thousands of job ads looking for people with any type of quantitative degree, including engineering. The value of the degree lies in the quantitative skills you will develop, more than the engineering-specific job preparation. Some people with engineering degrees even choose to go on to become patent agents or technical salespeople, etc. While you can certainly aim for an actual engineering job, you can rest assured that there will be plenty of other job opportunities out there if there is not much hiring in engineering when you graduate.