<p>Quentin,
Please note that the salaries for teachers with masters degrees (which is all of them in PA, as it is a continuing education requirement) for the current contract tops out at $94,219 and $96,000 respectively. That's for 9 months of work, done by 4 pm, for any grade or subject.
<a href="http://www.mtlsd.org/district/stuff/negotiations%20fact%20sheet%202004.pdf#search='mt%20lebanon%20teacher%20salary'%5B/url%5D">http://www.mtlsd.org/district/stuff/negotiations%20fact%20sheet%202004.pdf#search='mt%20lebanon%20teacher%20salary'</a>
<a href="http://www.pittsburghlive.com/x/tribune-review/education/s_295358.html%5B/url%5D">http://www.pittsburghlive.com/x/tribune-review/education/s_295358.html</a>
Again, I am not bashing teachers. Neither of these is the district I live in. I am only saying that in many districts, teachers are very well paid and receive nice regular increases with almost 100% job security, regardless of the kind of job they do. It is a very secure profession.</p>
<p>I have a feeling that there isn't an engineering shortage in this country. If there really was, people wouldn't be getting laid off and job instability, later on wouldn't be as much of an issue. I don't want to make a career out of engineering but at the same time, I want to have a solid back up profession. This is my main concern with engineering: though it provides an excellent backup choice (almost guaranteed job with solid 50K+ salary), it may burn other bridges like medicine and law or even business due to the significant grade deflation.</p>
<p>In the end, I guess it's a trade off. You're lowering chances of admission into top graduate schooling (med/law/pharmacology/etc...) but automatically have a solid back up career you can turn to if need be. If you're majoring in pure sciences/liberal arts/non-technical majors - you will not get a decent job after graduation and you're forced to be a very high GPA and persue grad. studies. Either way, there's a sacrifice that must be made - neither option is really superior to the other.</p>
<p>This has easily one of the most sobering thread I have come across in a long time, if not ever. Thank you OH_DAD for presenting your points with such clarity and poignacy and others for the counter points. The global economy and world village cuts both ways. Borders are dissolved by Internet and fast access points. The have's can no longer hold on to their wealth and tradition like a birth-right, neither do the have-nots be restrained to their old and usual predicament, not in this information age. Nobody canbe complacent, regardless you are a student trying to choose a major/career, or mid-line manager risk being shove aside. To a larger degree, whole companies also risk being replaced by upstarts, if they dont subscribe to new-school methods of ensuring competitiveness, and survival. And to an even larger sense, whole countries struggle against being stagnant, overtaken. As much as America still lead world economy, there is reason to fear the future may not dealt with the US the kindness it has in the past. I am sad that the world has come to this point. And I am struggling to catch a hint, any hint of what does it mean to live and work in this twenty-first century, what will I tell my child about it.</p>
<p>eternity_hope2005,</p>
<p>Graduate schools all know about the "serious grade deflation" that presumably comes along with a major in engineering...not just engineering graduate schools, but also schools of law, medicine, pharmaceutics, etc. If anything, I'd think that top graduate schools would see someone who graduated UUIC or a similar program with a 3.0 GPA as being a stronger candidate for being able to survive a tough undergrad program (and therefore would probably be able to handle the workload of whatever graduate degree they are pursuing).</p>
<p>quentin, many professors around here (florida) make around that much at the top state universities (fsu, ucf, uf, etc)</p>
<p>
[quote]
Graduate schools all know about the "serious grade deflation" that presumably comes along with a major in engineering...not just engineering graduate schools, but also schools of law, medicine, pharmaceutics, etc. If anything, I'd think that top graduate schools would see someone who graduated UUIC or a similar program with a 3.0 GPA as being a stronger candidate for being able to survive a tough undergrad program (and therefore would probably be able to handle the workload of whatever graduate degree they are pursuing).
[/quote]
</p>
<p>Well, you'd think so. But then you would notice how successful MIT premeds and prelaws have to present the same kinds of grades as premeds from other (easier) schools to get admitted. If what you are saying is true, then the average GPA's of MIT students admitted to these professional schools would be lower. They are not.</p>
<p>
[quote]
Sakky, the above is from your OWN source showing skepticism about medical tourism on a significant scale! I don't think you have much of a ground to stand on.....
...the fact is, even if someone assumes your argument about "engineering oursourcing" = "medical tourism" to be true, the <strong>SCALE</strong> of engineering outsourcing is much, much larger than med-tourism! Your point is totally minimized.....if someone is taking about trilliions of dollars, and you argue about chump change, you're going to sound ignorant...I'm sorry, that's the truth. Show me the percentages like you SHOULD be doing, instead of bringing up one-off articles that end up taking my side, as the one above did.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>My point is totally minimized? My point is that there is such a thing as medical outsourcing, as even you must now admit is true. </p>
<p>And does the article really take "your side"? The balance of the article that you are talking about concedes that on the whole, medical outsourcing will happen. So don't tell me that the article takes your side. You know it doesn't. </p>
<p>But look. I have never disputed that there will be such a thing as engineering outsourcing. Just like there is going to be outsourcing of many things. I even agree that there are certain parts of engineering outsourcing that will be extensive, namely isolated engineering jobs with little interaction with either fixed capital or with other people. However, I think you would concede that there are certain parts of medical outsourcing that will be extensive, namely plastic surgery and radiology. However, just like other parts of medical outsourcing, namely life-saving procedures that have to be performed immediately will suffer little from outsourcing, you must concede that there are many engineering jobs that will suffer little from outsourcing - namely those where the plants themselves are located in the US. For example, of all the oil platforms that are offshore of Texas and Louisiana, are all those petroleum engineering jobs going to be outsourced to India? How? Of all the oil refineries that are on the Texas Gulf Coast, are all those jobs going to be outsourced? The only way to do that is to take the entire refinery itself and move it to another country, which obviously isn't going to happen anytime soon, if ever. Heck, the US is actually talking about vastly increasing the number of refineries in the US. </p>
<p>So tell me, aehmo, how do you propose that these engineering jobs be outsourced? </p>
<p>
[quote]
yeah, right! There's already an ocean of competition...what's a few more buckets? I'm headed for the safe green pastures of a MD degree, or a DDS degreee.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>And you still refuse to answer the central question that I have posed to you time and time again. What else is better to major in as an undergrad, if not engineering? Getting an engineering degree doesn't mean that you can't do other things. Plenty of people finish their engineering degrees and also go to med school or dental school. But you still have to get a bachelor's degree in SOMETHING. </p>
<p>What an engineering degree gives you is safety in case you don't get into med school or dental school. May I remind you that half of all people who apply to US med-schools get rejected from every single one they apply to. That's right - every single one. And that's just those people who apply. Plenty of other people don't even apply because they know they can't get in. If you have less than a 2.5, you know you're not getting in anywhere, so you're not going to waste your time applying. </p>
<p>So for all those people who can't get in, what do you advise them to do? Kill themselves? They still have to live their lives. </p>
<p>So again I ask, if engineering is such a bad thing to major in, what's better? Or are you just going to dodge the question again?</p>
<p>
[quote]
Smart doesn't mean squat in engineering after you're 30 -- you're going to get paid the same as everyone else....between 90k-110k long term in the bay area. .
[/quote]
</p>
<p>How's that? Believe me, there are PLENTY of people in the Bay Area who can only dream of making 90-110k a year. All those people in the Bay Area who are washing dishes and answering phones and making coffee are almost never going to make 90-110k a year. And yes, many of them have college degrees. </p>
<p>The point is, at least the engineering degree can get you a decent living. Plenty of other degrees can't even get you that.</p>
<p>
[quote]
If you're majoring in pure sciences/liberal arts/non-technical majors - you will not get a decent job after graduation and you're forced to be a very high GPA and persue grad. studies. Either way, there's a sacrifice that must be made - neither option is really superior to the other.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>I would still submit that the 'worst' deal are those pure science majors. Not only do you have grade deflation, but you STILL end up with no secure career path.</p>
<p>"My point is totally minimized? My point is that there is such a thing as medical outsourcing, as even you must now admit is true. "</p>
<p>Anybody following this thread will realize that you've lost almost every point you've tried to make.</p>
<p>"And you still refuse to answer the central question that I have posed to you time and time again. What else is better to major in as an undergrad, if not engineering?"</p>
<p>It is much better to into grad schools for MEDICINE, LAW, DENTISTRY, PHARMACOLOGY etc., etc., and you don't need an engineering ugrad degree to get into those fields, do you? The grade deflation from a tech ugrad-degree may ruin your chances at the real careers.......people have answered your silly questions a billion times...why don't you read the posts before reiterating the same question like a broken record ?</p>
<p>"All those people in the Bay Area who are washing dishes and answering phones and making coffee are almost never going to make 90-110k a year. "</p>
<p>What on this thread had told you that you're talking to future dishwashers? Why would future dishwashers be interested in their careers enuf to ask on a discussion board?...the whole point of this thread is that if you're smart enough to be thinking about your future, you should apply to med school, law school etc, dental school etc. If you're smart, you'll get into one of these professional schools and have a much easier life than any other profession....leave engineering for the ones that love it too much, or can't get into med school.</p>
<p>
[quote]
Anybody following this thread will realize that you've lost almost every point you've tried to make.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>OK, so we'll have a vote. Let's let the people here decide who they will vote for, you or me. Who do think they will vote for?</p>
<p>
[quote]
It is much better to into grad schools for MEDICINE, LAW, DENTISTRY, PHARMACOLOGY etc., etc., and you don't need an engineering ugrad degree to get into those fields, do you? The grade deflation from a tech ugrad-degree may ruin your chances at the real careers.......people have answered your silly questions a billion times...why don't you read the posts before reiterating the same question like a broken record ?
[/quote]
</p>
<p>Oh really? And when have you answered it? I have asked you to name a specific undergrad major that people should major in, and you still won't do it. You name grad things to do, but I asked you for UNDERGRAD. Still dodging the question, I see.</p>
<p>And you say that engineering may ruin your grades. Then again, it may not. On the other hand, if you get an art history degree and you can't get into those other programs you cite, what are you going to do now? </p>
<p>
[quote]
What on this thread had told you that you're talking to future dishwashers? Why would future dishwashers be interested in their careers enuf to ask on a discussion board?...the whole point of this thread is that if you're smart enough to be thinking about your future, you should apply to med school, law school etc, dental school etc. If you're smart, you'll get into one of these professional schools and have a much easier life than any other profession....leave engineering for the ones that love it too much, or can't get into med school.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>Oh, so nobody who cares about their careers ever ends up as a dishwasher anyway? This never happens to anybody, right? </p>
<p>And so I see that you admit that some people can't get into med-school. In fact, I would argue that it is most people that can't get into med-school. Like I said, half of all who apply don't get in anywhere. And plenty of people don't even apply because they already know they can't get in anywhere. You have to think about what you are going to do if you can't get in. </p>
<p>So what advice do you have for all those people who can't get in? Should they all shoot themselves?</p>
<p>And what about people who don't WANT to be doctors?</p>
<p>Sakky, let me ask my question again. The receptionists which you cite who are twenty times better will probably improve the productivity of a company minimally, if at all. Thus it makes sense that a receptionist who is twenty times better does not get paid better than other normal receptionists. The receptionists skills bring no value to the company. But don't you think that if engineering companies hired engineers who were twenty times better, there company would become significantly more productive. Thus, I don't think it is fair to compare the salary system of receptionists to engineers. Engineering is a field where profits will be made by hiring the top talent. Even look at teaching. While I believe that the best teachers can make learning the material easier, and can do much better jobs than average teachers, these great teachers do not bring value or profits directly to the company. But again, the superstar engineers (as seen by Google) do in fact bring profits which justifies their being paid more. </p>
<p>Let me give you an example. Most cafeteria chefs at companies probably get a pretty standard and relatively low salary. We can both agree that the food at these cafeterias is pretty standard and brings little value to the companies, so there is little reason to pay any chef a larger sum of money. However at google, by hiring a great chef, they managed to increase company morale and thus productivity. Since in this case, the great chef improved the value and increased the profits of the company, Google offered numerous incentives and stock options to the chef.</p>
<p>"And what about people who don't WANT to be doctors?"</p>
<p>They can work in corporate engineering if they'd like :) after a few years, they may CHANGE their minds.</p>
<p>"But don't you think that if engineering companies hired engineers who were twenty times better, there company would become significantly more productive. Thus, I don't think it is fair to compare the salary system of receptionists to engineers. Engineering is a field where profits will be made by hiring the top talent. "</p>
<p>JMA - you have a idealistic view! Yes, ideally if someone wins programming competitions and works 20x faster than others, he should get 20x as much pay....but the reality is that he may get paid 10% more than the others, or 20% more tops! why?...because that engineer cannot be allowed to make 2M per year. Management usually treat computer employees like screws....if you lose one, you can always get another. </p>
<p>No manager will blow his budget by overpaying an employee....he'd rather get 20x more employees, which will </p>
<p>1)move him up he corporate ladder, since a managers power is directly proportional to the number of employees he commands</p>
<p>2)allow him to be more flexible with new types of projects he can bargain upper bosses into giving him.</p>
<p>3)allow him to foster more competition among the ranks, so that he always has a subset of employees who'll worship his decisions! every group of engineers has a "inner circle" who make the big decisions with the boss....the line between inner circle and outer circle is very fuzzy and usually leads to tons of jealously problems :)...this works in the managers favor!</p>
<p>4)make him less dependent on a single employee, which would be a huge mistake on his part if he allowed himself to be in that position!</p>
<p>....never make the mistake of thinking that managers will pay you what you're worth. They themseleves are usually trying to move up the ladder as fast as possible, since that's the mentality it takes get into management in the first place!....they don't want to know what you're "worth", unless you have pull with some VPs or something, which is unlikely.</p>
<p>Interesting...
1. I was not aware that some teachers make $90,000 in a year. This surprises me; where I'm from, top teacher salaries are around $60,000. However, I stand by my point that most teachers will never see six figures (well, maybe because of inflation, but you get my point). Most teachers can probably expect to live the bulk of their lives making $30-60k per year in today's money. This is good money, but definitely not enough to make you rich.</p>
<ol>
<li>College professors aren't the same things as K-12 teachers. They usually have a lot more education (every once in a while you'll find a teacher with a Ph.D or equivalent, but in general teachers have master's degrees or less), and getting tenure at even a "mediocre" university takes a lot longer than getting tenure at a K-12 school. Furthermore, I will offer that it's intellectually more difficult to be a professor and manage a research group than to teach K-12, not to disparage K-12 teaching which is a noble and difficult profession.</li>
</ol>
<p>
[quote]
Sakky, let me ask my question again. The receptionists which you cite who are twenty times better will probably improve the productivity of a company minimally, if at all. Thus it makes sense that a receptionist who is twenty times better does not get paid better than other normal receptionists. The receptionists skills bring no value to the company. But don't you think that if engineering companies hired engineers who were twenty times better, there company would become significantly more productive. Thus, I don't think it is fair to compare the salary system of receptionists to engineers. Engineering is a field where profits will be made by hiring the top talent. Even look at teaching. While I believe that the best teachers can make learning the material easier, and can do much better jobs than average teachers, these great teachers do not bring value or profits directly to the company. But again, the superstar engineers (as seen by Google) do in fact bring profits which justifies their being paid more.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>Actually, it is entirely fair to talk about highly productive receptionists. Again, let's follow your hypothetical example of a receptionist that is 20 times more productive than the average receptionist. Then, ideally, the company would simply be able to fire 20 of its normal receptionists, to be replaced by that super-receptionist. After all, that super-receptionist can do the work of 20 receptionists. That's what it means to be 20 times more productive. </p>
<p>The rest of what you are saying is what I wish would happen with the salaries of star engineers, but often times does not. In fact, it is exactly what I am talking about - star engineers don't get star salary. </p>
<p>As a corollary, I find the salary structure of engineering to be almost "Communist" in the sense that average or below-average engineers get paid pretty good money, but star engineers don't receive corresponding star pay. Like I said, for some normal guy from Western Montana, getting an engineering degree from Montana Tech and getting that 50k starting pay (in a cheap state like Montana) is a sweet deal. Sure beats the heck out of the other options he has. </p>
<p>This is why I have actually completely disagreed with aehmo, despite his tactics. I actually agree with maybe 25% of what he has said in that other career fields may indeed be better for the stars. </p>
<p>Where I disagree with aehmo is in 2 main points - #1, not everybody can make it to those other career fields. In fact, few can. Like I've been constantly saying, half of all med-school applicants get rejected by every single med-school they apply to. And that's just talking about those who actually make it to the application stage - plenty of people leave the premed process before they even apply, because they get bad premed grades, or bad MCAT scores, or whatever. Even at Harvard, 10% of the students who apply to med-school get rejected by every single med-school they apply to. And I think we can all agree that Harvard students, especially Harvard premeds, are pretty smart and hard-working. Hence, you have to think about what you are going to do if you happen to be one of those people who doesn't get in. </p>
<p>Hence, of all those people who can't make it to those other career fields, engineering is a very sweet deal. There are plenty of people who get Art History degrees from no-name schools and who float from odd job to odd job who surely would be better off if they had gotten an engineering degree instead. Like I said, if you're just some regular kid in Western Montana, you could do a whole lot worse than getting an engineering degree from Montana Tech. </p>
<p>My second point of contention with aehmo is that I don't think that those other career paths are as great as he says they are. I'm not saying they're bad, I'm just saying that I don't think they are as good as he implies they are. Take law, for instance. I'm sure somebody like Greybeard or ariesathena would strongly object to the assertion that a law degree guarantees you any sort of career. Sure, some lawyers do very well. But there are other lawyers, especially those who graduate from mediocre law schools and/or graduate with weak law school grades, who have serious problems with employability. Sure, you can then try to open your own practice, but how are you going to get profitable clients? That becomes more of an entrepreneurship problem more than a legal problem. See the next paragraph.</p>
<p>Physicians and dentist career paths are often times intimately tied to how well you run your private practice, which is really an entrepreneurship skill more than it is a medical/dental skill. It's not like you can simply open a door to a private practice and automatically get a guaranteed and profitable client base. You can be the best doctor in the world, but if you don't know how to market yourself, your private practice may not generate much money. </p>
<p>Which is why I advocate the safety of the engineering undergrad degree. You can get an engineering degree and then try to opt for another career path, which also include investment bankinf or consulting. If you don't make it, well, at least you can still be an engineer. It's a lot better than nothing. While I do agree that engineering does have grade deflation that, on the margins, may hurt your chances of getting in, I still think it's a fair tradeoff. The worst thing that can happen to you is that you choose an easy (but unmarketable) major like Leisure Studies in order to maximize your GPA because you want to get into med-school, and STILL not getting in. As the AMCAS numbers show, there are a LOT of people who don't get in.</p>
<p>aehmo, you should really stop arguing and hide in your green pastures...you may convince everyone here to become doctors and then the pastures will certainly no longer be green:):)</p>
<p>Doctors are paid so highly because so few people can become doctors. It is a long, arduous and expensive process if you're even accepted. And being a doctor is hardly free money; various reports show that doctors who specialize in high risk (and big money) procedures are quitting because of the enormous insurance hikes recently. Doctors are always on edge, one wrong operation can cost them their career. Before people sued if the doctor amputated the wrong leg, now they sue if their nose looks more like michelle pfieffer's than angelina jolie's</p>
<p>Here is an interesting article that seems to relate to this topic:
<a href="http://www.computerworld.com/governmenttopics/government/legislation/story/0,10801,106343,00.html?source=NLT_CAR&nid=106343%5B/url%5D">http://www.computerworld.com/governmenttopics/government/legislation/story/0,10801,106343,00.html?source=NLT_CAR&nid=106343</a>
Here is an exerpt:
The H-1B program, however, is plagued by myth and abuse. One myth is that the law requires U.S. employers to seek H-1B applicants only when qualified Americans can't be found. But it wasn't a scarcity of talented Americans that led U.S. companies to max out the 65,000 H-1B visa cap for fiscal 2006; it was because H-1B workers have largely become a first option, not a last resort.
U.S. Department of Labor statistics show a decline of 221,000 employed U.S. technical workers in six major computer and engineering job classifications from 2000 to 2004. Surely many of these skilled workers could qualify for positions filled by H-1Bs.Many H-1B visas -- including the 20,000 for advanced-degree graduates of U.S. institutions \ are used by companies that offer lower-cost technical services by non-U.S. citizens. This leads to wage suppression. The 2003 IEEE-USA salary survey reflected this with the first decline in median income for U.S. IEEE members in 31 years.
This is not surprising, considering the wages the Labor Department lets U.S. companies pay H-1B workers. A review of the Labor Condition Application database for the first quarter of fiscal 2005 reveals that an H-1B electrical engineer makes $10 an hour, a Web site translator $8 per hour and a secondary school math teacher just $16,034 a year. The law requires that H-1B employees be paid the prevailing wage for their occupations, but the implementation of these regulations can be, and is, easily gamed.</p>
<p>"Doctors are always on edge, one wrong operation can cost them their career."</p>
<p>Well, less than 1% of doctors actually lose their licenses over their lifetimes, so this risk is quite small.....also, if you fear lawsuits, then you can always</p>
<p>1> do a good job so that you don't get sued.
2> Move into non-surgical specialty, where you still make 160k but the risk of a lawsuits is very minimal.</p>
<p>"various reports show that doctors who specialize in high risk (and big money) procedures are quitting because of the enormous insurance hikes recently"</p>
<p>I'd love to see just one report/article....if you have a link, could you please post, as I am curious to see where they may quit to (won't be engineering, but it's still interesting to know).</p>
<p>"you may convince everyone here to become doctors and then the pastures will certainly no longer be green"</p>
<p>lolz...yeah, that's true!!! I better quit and let sakky lead them into corporate engineering instead...why am I stiring up competition for myself? I guess I'm confident about getting into med school so I don't mind a little bit of competition....I'd rather have a career that's tough to get into but easy to do day-to-day than a career that's easy toget into but is hard to stick thru for more than 5 years.</p>