Outsourcing gnaws at engineers

Bob Bellinger Contributing Editor

hings are looking up again in the electronics design community. Or are they?

The EE Times "2004 Worldwide Salary & Opinion Survey" certainly points to some hopeful signs. Salaries have taken a dramatic jump after having plateaued last year, EEs and their bosses feel more secure in their jobs, product development is on the upswing, and more than 90 percent of this year's 1,464 U.S. respondents and 472 European respondents called their profession "fun."

Yet merely a third see the U.S. high-technology industry as "on the rise." That's lower than during the recent technology recession. One factor: The shadow of outsourcing hangs over the profession. Half the designers and managers answering our online survey, conducted from June 24-July 9 and July 26-July 27, wonder what's in store for them — and their jobs — in the coming years.

Of one thing you can be confident: Our North American and European subscribers always speak their minds when they call up these surveys online. Of course, they haven't always been right: Back in the 1970s, for example, EEs predicted dire consequences from the competition with Japan. And the downsizing wave of the early '90s shook up everyone.

But let's face it: U.S. and European engineers will always face competition and new challenges. After all, staying on top means never sitting still.

• Mean wages edge closer to six-figure mark
  ''An engineer in India will never make what I make in salary and my employer knows that very well. I am a target.''

• Engineering is still a 'fun' thing to do for most
  ''I was willing to take a salary reduction for the promise of greater long-term security.''

• It's an outsourced world, EEs acknowledge
  Outsourcing ''is very bad for the current generation of engineers, future generation of engineers and bad for America overall.''

• Bush favored over Kerry in November vote
  ''The global economy is sucking us dry, and a general pessimism is pervasive. Everyone I know dislikes their job and is worried about their future.''

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