Break Points
Doom And Gloom
Jack Ganssle
8/24/2009 1:10 PM EDT
This figure nearly matches the national unemployment rate (the U-3 rate, for those actively seeking a job) of 9.4 percent. This is the highest rate, other than 1982/1983, since the Bureau of Labor Statistics started tracking the data in 1948.
(Some argue that U-6, which includes those so dispirited they have given up looking for a job, is more representative. I have trouble understanding how anyone who has to support a family will give up, but that number is over 16%. Check out in Figure 8 at Invescoaim for a graph of U-3 and U-6. The numbers themselves are scary, but the first derivative of recent data is horrifying).
Anecdotally, many companies looking for embedded people drop me an email. I usually get a couple a week, but since May there have been exactly two such queries. The demand for consultants also seems to have dried up.
The IEEE claims that unemployment for "all professional workers" is half that for EEs. I guess that means the thousands of pages of various bills in Congress will, as always, create enough confusion to keep lawyers, accountants and civil service workers busy.
The world needs engineers to design solutions for the many problems we face, and to create products that drive a vibrant marketplace. The US needs highly-paid workers " like engineers " for the same reasons, and to pay taxes. The average wage here is about $32k. Most engineers pay more than that in all forms of direct and indirect taxes. Without a solid tax base, it's hard to imagine how the nation will continue to support the bureaucracy.
In the poll on Embedded.com from ten months ago 72% of respondents were reasonably optimistic about their job prospects. Take this week's poll and let's see if and how the numbers have changed.
I had hoped that we learned from the last recession the peril of shedding engineers. Either managers have forgotten those painfully-acquired lessons, or are so desperate to cut costs they're sacrificing the future to stay afloat.
And that's a scary thought.
(Editor's Note: Jack's Embedded Poll Question this week is "What are your engineering job prospects?". To vote, go to the Embedded.com Home Page
Jack G. Ganssle is a lecturer and consultant on embedded development issues. He conducts seminars on embedded systems and helps companies with their embedded challenges. Contact him at jack@ganssle.com. His website is www.ganssle.com.
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krwada
8/24/2009 8:01 PM EDT
so... Where did all the engineering jobs go?
China?
India?
Walmart?
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jmdavid1789
8/25/2009 4:11 PM EDT
"I have trouble understanding how anyone who has to support a family will give up"
You will never give up feeding your family but you might give up giving your information to the unemployment agency.
Keep in mind that in order to belong to a category, you have to meet some conditions and constraints.
That can take time (away from real job seeking) and resource (every penny counts in that period).
In exchange, you expect them to give you links to job opportunities.
But if you do not see anything meaningful coming then it is like a bad investment and you lose faith in them.
What counts at the end is getting a job and in the meantime is not to waste your limited resource.
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ChrisGammell
8/27/2009 8:10 AM EDT
Aside from the fact that some people/companies ARE sacrificing future products and profitability for short term savings (really it's just a "me or you" mentality from managers), I feel like there is a notion that work can always be pushed out to some nebulous contractor. No one knows who, where or how much he costs yet, but people always think that there will be tons of available resources when engineering demand returns. I don't think that is the case...I think the best consultants will be snatched up first and then companies will be forced to go overseas, whether they want to or not. Too many people are jumping ship at the prospect of having to wait for a job until then. There's always the idea that some work can be pushed to the FAEs of vendors and suppliers, but their staffing levels are low right now and will continue to be because no one is actually BUYING, therefore no funding is available to hire more FAEs.
I don't really have a solution. I don't know if anyone does other than "wait it out". But I do think that when engineering demand comes back, it will come back with a vengeance, possibly with a smaller employment pool (remember people will also still be scared to leave their "stable" positions at the beginning of any upturn). Those who are talented, positioned to do some consulting and are capable of negotiating favorable employment contracts in the coming years will do well in my opinion.
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antiquus
8/27/2009 9:29 AM EDT
The engineering jobs didn't "go" anywhere: in most cases we engineered them away. Look at the changes in how EEs do business. Primarily, there is now very little "electrical" design in modern electronics.
CMOS signals simply work -- period. No more are the days of asymmetrical TTL. For instance, when was the last time you explained why "active low" was a good thing, or blew out a signal with a scope probe? LVDS and other high speed signals are equally unexciting: electrical interfaces have become the new geranimals.
RF problems fall into two categories. First, any embedded job with an RF front end is probably using a standards-based chip, and on a good day that function may be available from more than one vendor (GPS anyone?). The same goes for Ethernet, PCIe, SATA and all the other high-speed digital interfaces. Very few of us need to understand noise figures or any of that black magic. Second, what "RF" problems exist are very likely limited to impedance matching in FR4 or G10 PCBs, a task that some well-intentioned guy automated in the design tools a few years ago.
Designs based on random logic have simply been left in the dust. We can probably all draw the block diagram of each other's latest project: a microprocessor connected to a PLD or FPGA, some textbook RAM and ROM, and the LED interface is an I2C chip. Now we drop in an SOC microprocessor, (if not simply a prefab motherboard) that is selected for (a) memory capacity, or (b) whether it runs linux.
Software is also changed. In the other forums, Michael Barr and Dan Saks are arguing C and C++ (less filling, tastes great), when any significant project needs VHDL first, then the "software team" thanks you for _finally_ getting the PCB to them so they can get work done. EEs used to be the go-to guys for all things software, but today about 80% of the job ads are for C# and Java, with SQL, .NET and ASP experience.
Modern tools live up to all they promised: more accomplished, better results, fewer people. The schematic and PCB tools are fully integrated, they perform all the mundane checking for miswires and clearance violations. Optimized compilers have made assembly language the exception, not the norm, even for interrupt handlers: it is likely that the pipeline flush on your ARM9 is more expensive than the overhead of writing the handler in C.
And don't get me started on the modern business model of using "reference designs" and the prepackaged software that comes with them. Creative, 1st-order design is almost the exclusive domain of those few companies making the previously mentioned standard chips.
We did it, gentlemen. We made better cookie cutters, and then we debugged and optimized the guillotine. Basically, we designed ourselves out.
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oreduck
8/27/2009 12:46 PM EDT
antiquus,
The fact that engineering is highly productive does not reduce the number of engineering jobs. Instead, it makes the business of developing new products ever more profitable thus creating new opportunities for engineers.
The reason EE unemployment is high is due to the rapid and relentless outsourcing of engineering, primarily to China and India, but also to Russia, Singapore, Malaysia and others.
What many outsourcing companies have learned, however, is that headcount is not the whole story. Innovation and creativity, along with productivity are more important than headcount. I've been on projects where four engineers in a lab in the US have produced more real value than 50 engineer madly spinning their wheels in Shanghai.
The management that recognizes true value will survive and the practice of outsourcing will slow down, in due time.
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KenPeek
8/27/2009 1:05 PM EDT
Well, the prospects for getting a job are not so good in my local area, but there seem to be a lot of jobs away from home.
I think that this is one of the best times that a person could start a business. If you can "make it" during these trying times, you should be doing very well when the economy comes back.
If you _do_ decide to start a business, keep your overhead to a minimum. When the economy comes back, THEN you can worry about getting an office etc. Invent something useful that no one else offers, and sell it on eBay, iOffer, craigslist, etc. Make a web page-- the Internet is the absolute highest amount of advertising per dollar that you will ever be able to find.
All of us are pretty creative-- let's put that to good use and invent our way out of this mess!
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DaveArmour
8/27/2009 1:40 PM EDT
Having been unemployed since Jan I have to say I agree with all the above. Yes, we have designed ourselves out of work; yes, alot of jobs are headed overseas; yes, US engineers are the best at thinking outside the box; finally yes, there are people that have given up by moving to another profession (if they can).
The company that laid my group off boasted about record profits the following quarter. My phone has not rung yet.
Personally I refuse to give up because (in my mind) embedded engineers (EE and firmware) are going to be on the front lines of any recovery. Once companies decide to start producing new designs again we will be the first they call (I hope) because my talents cannot be learned from any book or replaced with any tool or language of the day. I have hunkered down, I am TRYING to make good use of my time. Besides where else can you have so much fun and earn a very decent salary other than the embedded world?
All that said, yes I am scared of what the future looks like.
Did you say WalMart is hiring...
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Dmd
8/28/2009 3:30 PM EDT
Jack, what were those painfully-acquired lessons of shedding engineers that we learned from the last recession? I have forgotten, too!
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Andrew B
8/29/2009 8:41 AM EDT
What crisis?
Have not seen any good EE or software developer unemployed or looking for Walmart type job...
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