Are there any bright spots in the job market?
It’s been a discouraging time on the career front for many engineers. The
January was a brutal month for layoffs and included many engineering-centric companies such as Microsoft, Boeing, and Caterpillar. Announced layoffs so far this year have already topped 300,000.
So without a doubt, this is a really bad time to be looking for a job.
So are there any bright spots for engineers? For one thing, the 7.6% statistic really doesn’t tell the whole story. Unemployment is worst for young people across all ages. If you look at people over age 25, then the rate is around 6%, which is still pretty ugly. But if you look for people with four year college degrees, and that’s most engineers, the unemployment rate is around 3.3%. But this category still needs further segmentation – it includes most people on Wall Street too.
Note that “green” jobs are on the rise: The number of job postings at TheLadders.com requiring an environmental-planning or engineering background has gone up about 25% over the past year. Any interest in project management for a wind-farm? That’s the kind of short term job that recruiters have to fill with an engineer.