Unless your kid can be an NFL superstar, or a superstar in any professional sport, they can do better as an engineer. They don't distinguish the engineering specialty and that varies pretty widely. Sites like this one comparing fields are pretty easy to find.
Plus, they'll never blow out a knee or suffer CTE from solving problems (although it might feel like it at times).
Unfortunately, that foundation is laid by second grade.
ReplyDeleteKids who can't read or understand English can't do word problems.
Kids who can't think can't solve logic problems.
"Get your kids into STEM fields"?
Try
"Get Your Kids Into Homeschool".
Then they'll crush STEM fields.
FIFY ;)
Before we moved from the Lost Angeleez area, I noticed the "fairness" was perverting STEM programs by making them STEAM, adding ARTS to it.
ReplyDeleteI thought the whole purpose behind STEM was to get away from the artsy-fartsy stuff and back to hard science.
I figured the Arts stuff was because the art lobby was pissed off about being excluded. For once.
DeleteMy wife and I used to joke about the fact that the various levels of government always buy art for airports and turnpike plazas but there's never an equivalent where they buy random electronic or mechanical things to put in art galleries.
So how did you fare against those "average lifetime earnings", even adjusting backwards for inflation?
Delete}:-]
Not even the tiniest fraction of a clue.
DeleteThat would require doing caring enough to do the math.
I approve this message. Some of the most interesting people i've worked with in 35 years of working in factories, foundries and construction were engineers. Guys who could do math in their heads that others could not do with a a calculator. A man named Harry Stein who as a boy of 15 was drafted by the Germany Army and was sent to Russia to fly ME109s and later came to the USA and became a Mechanical Engineer. To Guys who built roads, lakes and dams. Fine men all.
ReplyDeleteThe game starts in high school where nearly all of staff and teachers are liberal arts major, even the math and chemistry teachers. They talk up the liberal arts colleges and fields of study. Even if the student is an excellent candidate for an STEM field they passively discourage by saying how difficult the course will be.
ReplyDeleteYes I can multiple four/five digit numbers faster than a calculator,and yes there is a trick to it, but anything more than two or three significant digits is not needed in ninety five percent of engineering calculations.
Of course that doesn't include endorsement deals, commercial appearances, and other perks of the athletes. OTOH, an engineer can have a normal life instead of being famous. I'll take my engineering career any day, far more challenging and rewarding - and the work I do today will be in service for decades.
ReplyDeleteEven if your kids like the artsy stuff, STEM is still very useful. No matter what modern education theory may say, you CAN be good at both. Why limit them? The really successful artists are the ones that work WITH technology.
Zombie Leonardo da Vinci approved this message!
DeleteUnfortunately, not everyone is cut out to be an engineer. Furthermore, some of the engineering jobs are cyclical. Look at aerospace engineering as a prime example. Check around the NASA and contractor engineers out at KSC or the Cape and compare THEIR career earnings to the examples given. And when one is studying to be an engineer, and choosing the courses for the required specialization, one never truly knows whether the Watermelons (green on the outside, red on the inside) are going to "lead", in which case one had better major in environmental bovine feces, or if a Reagan or Trump will instead be in charge. And that DOES make a difference on the value of an individual engineering degree.
ReplyDeleteI'm sure you've noticed that out on the Cape you'll find a ton of people with other sorts of college degrees (biology, chemistry, whatever) who take jobs out there because of the better than typical pay for their fields.
DeleteBoth while I was and while I wasn't employed by Major Defense Contractor we referred to it as the accordion company. Expand for a new contract and suck up workers, then downsize after the contract and spit those workers out. So, yeah, you're exactly right about never knowing if an Obozo or a Reagan or Trump will instead be in charge. And that DOES make a difference on the value of an individual engineering degree.
I would challenge the numbers, which don't seem to be including starting salary and salary growth. Five million divided by 25 (an average career length) is $200,000 average per year. This isn't reasonable. If we increase that to 35 years and presume that it's all spent in Southern California, maybe – just maybe – it could be possible. I do know that $150,000 is a good salary today for a senior person with at least 20 years under his belt.
ReplyDeletePerhaps they are assuming a significant inflation rate?
As Mark Matis points out, engineering demand in various industries is cyclical. Cvil seems to be fairly constant, nuclear, not so much. Still I made enough to cover the lean times.
ReplyDeleteI think the big reason for the discrepancy is that engineers can earn good wages into their 70s if they so choose. NFL players are usually unmarketable by their mid 30s Thats only a ten year long professional career.
Yeah, but it's the football players and the basketball players what gets the chicks, bro!
Delete}:-]
That's a bug, not a feature.
DeleteThey get the gold-digging whores (thank you, Bill Burr!), who effectively halve the lifetime earnings of the jocks yet again.
The European term for that move is "own goal".
"According to the NFL Players Association, the average NFL career lasts just over three years and translates into average career earnings of about $4 million after taxes."
DeleteThat would be a pure win for the NFL player if the time value of money was considered; if he shoots for 5% annual inflation-adjusted returns then he can beat the typical engineer's salary forever onward without ever having to work a day again.
On the other hand, "if the time value of money was considered" never seems to be the case when a young person receives a sudden huge windfall, which is probably why I found the above NFL Player's Association quote in a story entitled "Why so many ex-NFL players struggle with money".
Years ago, I was looking for something to watch on TV and stumbled across one of those "inside the training camp" shows. Some NFL team. I lingered for a minute, just long enough to hear these newly drafted NFL players wrestling with why their checks were so small, and realizing how much tax they were paying. The had no clue what was going to happen and how much they were going to pay. Suddenly they were the rich who needed to pay for everyone. It was hilarious.
DeleteI hate to break this to you, Aesop, but engineers do a damn good job of finding those "gold-digging whores who effectively halve THEIR lifetime earnings as well." Except the jocks' versions tend to be more visually pleasant.
DeleteI worked in a tech field all my life. I have known geniuses who were unable to do the work and could only talk about it. I have known good people with little to no college who were very capable. I have known "go-getters" who were only good at office politics. The bottom line is that some people are good at complex tasks and some are not and actual education is not a predictor of success. I think that you are probably born with the ability and the schooling might polish it or encourage it but if you aren't born with it no amount of school will give it to you.
ReplyDeleteDilbert (Scott Adams) referred to that as having "the knack".
DeleteIn my experience and observations, "the knack" tends to run in families, which would indicate it is a genetic trait.
DeleteOne of the things that seems to go hand in hand with it is those who work around them who feel threatened by it. You will always find people who will work to negate that talent in others.
I was working at a high tech company that suddenly developed a process problem in the in-house fab that made a critical sole-source part. I was encouraged to transfer into the area to help. I demurred. I was sure I could track down the problem, but the supervisor and dept head were not people who would allow me to apply myself to it in the fashion I would require to be effective. They couldn't figure it out, and I knew them well enough to know they would hamstring me. As I expected, the company failed, and the assets in three states were auctioned off in bankruptcy proceedings.
It was a neat product, and some of us were in the process of greatly expanding it's potential, but I had enough experience to know better than to beat my head against another wall for people who were going to work against the company's best interest. BT;DT, didn't need any more t-shirts. I turned off the lights in the Engineering Dept in the Silicon Valley branch. (There was a FL location, and the third was in NH? Twenty years ago.)
I'm pretty sure The Knack broke up around 1982.
DeleteI've done seat of the pants engineering, construction management, and field service work for a very high tech company, AND I have a Bachelor of Arts degree with a couple decades working in entertainment... so I feel pretty safe saying that in large mass market arts (like Circ Du Solei) there is a LOT of engineering, and a lot of very technical people. For every person on the stage, there are a dozen who worked to make it possible, or work every show to make it so.
ReplyDeleteOne of my professors pointed out that the school's surveys had something like 95% of the graduates who were performers working NOT in performance, but 95% of the tech graduates were ACTUALLY WORKING in arts.
My graduate program had one of the TWO licensed autocad sites at the school, the other was in the engineering department, and this was back in '90.
My point is that it's possible to be artistic and even arty while still being technical.
Do I want STEAM to REPLACE STEM? HELL NO... the whole point of STEM was to identify and save the kids who were interested and capable, from the general grind of school. The engineering mindset is the LEAST likely to be able to put up with the busy work and the LIES of PC nonsense. For the sake of keeping the bridges and buildings standing, STEM NEEDS to be separated from the diversity bean olympics and the brain altering lies of pc....
When you look at professional sports, the careers are short, the players are often VERY unsophisticated, and they are surrounded by people who EXIST to separate them from their money- agent gets 10%, manager gets another 10%, TAX MAN gets half, and the hangers on get the rest. The music industry is very similar. If Billy Joel can go broke, anyone can.
I'm encouraging both my young daughters in STEM whenever I can, but if they don't have the talent, they won't be happy there. I'm doing it not because of the paycheck, but because of the personal satisfaction that comes from solving problems and building things.
Also, look at the flip side of the push to get kids to "code" and to develop STEM grads. Who benefits most from an overabundance of labor in a given field?? The business owners. If they can develop the excess labor locally, fluent in english and steeped in US culture, they won't NEED H1B visas because the abundance of candidates will drive down wages.
They aren't doing it for YOUR benefit...
nick
Ah, The Knack! "Good Girls Don't" ROCKS, and you'd never get it on air today....
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