I am on my way to Seattle tomorrow to address the NCSL (National Conference of State Legislators, 8000 state legislators from 50 states) annual meeting there on Thursday on taxes and state budgets.
I will also speak to the Republican Legislative Campaign Committee at lunch on Friday about how to promote growth in their states. I can summarize my talk in 2 words, technology, and education. We have to learn that in today’s global economy, we are competing for capital, not jobs. Human capital tops the list.
Bill Gates spoke to the group today on the subject. Here’s what he had to say:
When I compare our high schools to what I see when I’m traveling abroad, I am terrified for our workforce of tomorrow. … In 2001, India graduated almost a million more students from college than the United States did. China graduates twice as many students with bachelor’s degrees as the U.S., and they have six times as many graduates majoring in engineering. In the international competition to have the biggest and best supply of knowledge workers, America is falling behind.
This is our wake up call, folks. we may not get a second chance.
JR
Engineers have never been a very large portion of the u.s work force. There are 1.5 million engineers in the U.S.A (those with college degrees – real engineers). There 140 million working people in the U.S right now. So engineers are around 1 % of the work force.
In the best years engineers only represented 5 % of the graduating class of the top colleges in this country.
Our educational system is fine, its our culture that needs a wake up call. You get what you value.
We do not place a high value on engineers, so we’re producing less of them. Its just that simple. In any US corporation, the better paid employees are not engineers, they are salespeople. In our culture, the salesperson is the most valued role in any organization. That may be appropriate, because nothing happens in any company until there is a sale. The downside is that we are slowly becoming a nation of salespeople and facilitators. Engineering, implementation, and operations are not valued as highly in the United States and are appropriately being shifted overseas. I fear one day we will be left with a nation of hairdressers and real estate agents.
Even if I were to agree that we really ‘want’ more engineers, our culture just isn’t oriented toward that. Most people in the United States view college as primarily a social experience. That’s a problem if you want those students to study math and science. We constantly hear how concerned people are about education in this country, but its mostly a consumer concern- we want the education we ‘purchase’ from the schools to meet our expectations. There really is much less interest in actual learning. You only need to turn on a television or browse a magazine rack to confirm that our culture is not all that intellectual.
Finally, I question whether Bill Gates really wants more engineers in the US, or more cheap engineers. If engineers are the highest paid positions in a company, market forces will create a greater supply of engineers. Most engineers I know are looking for a way out of technical jobs into management roles with higher pay. How is that possible if engineers are so urgently needed?
Glad to see t hat we have stirred up such a lively debate on education. This susbject is on everybody’s minds today.
Paul, Bruce, and Anthony raise an important point. We have to have businesses here willing to hire the engineers once they are trained. The fact that young students are going into law and medicine, both dominated by government spending, is not a healthy sign for the long term health of the economy.
I am just completing a study on the causes of the collapse of US tech employment and the subsequent shift of tech R&D centers to Asia. One of the most important factors was the total collapse of capital spending in the US on high-tech IT equipment over the past 5 years. Tech capital spending is the source of productivity growth that feeds increases in living standards. I am hopeful that things are beginning to stir for new telecom legislation that would trigger big capex here, but it’s not a done deal. In the short-term,growth is very strong. In the long-term, we need to fix this problem.
JR
I agree with Anthony on this. The future job prospects for engineering students in the US are bleak. Bill Gates bemoans the lack of engineering students and at the same time primarily only hires new graduates – many whom are not even US citizens – while at the same time spurning experienced engineers. Who in their right mind is going to pursue a career which will be over by the time they are 35.
Smart young people are pursuing careers in law and medicine because those offer the most attractive job prospects.
Good subjects. I hope that you will post your addresses. A summury of the conferences would be very insightful.
How are you going to approch the subject of education? The theory of why we need to change? or What actual steps are needed to change the educational system for the better?
Barry: Valid. But the point is that there are not enough american Engg graduates to take up jobs available in the US.
-v
Mr. Rutledge, I recall a column you wrote in *Forbes* some years ago where you took exception to somebody who used the term “intellectual capital”. Your gripe was that human beings are rented, not purchased, the distinction being a moral one you wished people payed more attention to. Your use of the term “human capital” makes me wonder if you’ve changed your mind, gotten sloppy in your use of such characterizations, or perhaps I am misunderstanding something. Would you straighten me out?
Scott
Scott,
Well, I do get sloppy once in a while, guilty as charged. There is a difference though between trying to measure himan calital on a balance sheet of a company (which does not own it) and referring to the human capital embodied in a person thgou education and experience. Think I will use a different term in future.
Regards,
John
A Contrarian View On Churning Out Huge Numbers of People with Technology Degrees
Some times great leaders and innovators arise totally outside the formal education system e.g. Bill Gates, himself, and Pater Jennings.
The shelf value of a degree hinges on the ability of those who acquire them to use their skills. Has anyone looked at the percentages of technology graduates actually employed in their specialization 1, 5 , 10 years post graduation.
The current policies of the United States goverment (L-1, H-1 programs) would seem to indicate a desire to diminish job opportunities for future technology graduates.
Where are we headed if an effort is made to churn out a huge number of technology graduates without jobs? A huge misallocation of resources, a cess pool of embitered people?
There’s a valid point to be made about our problematic education system — but not with this mathematical sleight of hand.
China has over a 1 Billion people, India a little less — versus 287 million in the U.S. Of course they graduate more people.
The important number is what is the per capita College graduation rate, and how many HS students go on to graduate College?
I suspect those numbers are a little less alarmist . . .