A Fork in the Road

As a small aerospace company I expect to make less money and to pay more taxes.

And the Bailout will make what money we have worth that much less. No wealth was put in the system so the rest of the currency was diluted by a significant percentage.

The banks and regulatory agents of the government made this happen over greed and no accountability is being put forth so justice is not being served.

Take the lemons that life gives you and make lemonade.

Brad

In the worst likely situation over the next 5 years 25% of us will be unemployed, 25% on the other end will still be partying off of their own deep pockets and the 50% in the middle will be worrying and saving their money. Among the poor losers there will be a lot of good folks who were just unlucky. The Depression of the 1930's was like that until later as the government infrastructure projects put enough money in Grandpa's pocket to "buy a washing machine and a Chevrolet." And then the war came along.

One good bet is to figure out how to get some of the low 25% to supply the party on the other end by investing capital you borrow from the 50% of the money savers in the middle. I'm talking legitimate business enterprises here. Why risk yourself on doing scams when there's still a lot of money to be made honestly?

Ed Weldon

That what has me worried Ed. And then the war came along.

The very Banks who encouraged the public to help them put us in this mess have a habit of funding both sides. The industrial war machine has no qualms about it. Our present legislative branch ignored the banking industries securitizing of mortgages for 15 years. Can you say Quid Pro Que.

Brad

The fact that our next president is comfortable with consumer electronics does not demonstrate that he is technologically savvy. He is not an engineer or scientist. He has no technical background in either is education or employment history. He does seem to be able to identify the currently "hot" technical issues and get on the side most conducive to his political advancement.

That shows that he is a savvy politician, but it does not show any depth of technical understanding. Few politicians have that.

rutleddc -- Take heart. The new energy secretary Steven Chu is very technically savvy and is certain to have a big influence in the administration. I would expect other such selections to positions involving technology to be similarly qualified.

I figure we are past the era when the only qualification for leadership in the federal government is idealogical purity.......Well at least for a few years. The American voters tend to have a short memory. The road is certain to present another important fork before too many years as our country tires of having to postpone the partying and pay off the big debt.

Ed Weldon

Based on BHO's cabinet picks one could argue that idealogical purity is still the primary qualification, only now to the "progressive" ideology. It is the nature of putting together a government based on who you owe from the election. For example, our new attorney general has almost no background with terrorism even though that will probably be his biggest challenge, but he is a loyal soldier to the party (see Clinton pardons). I don't see any change in the way of doing business so far except that BHO is a much better communicator than Bush, much more charismatic.

rutledcc -- I could call you a cynic. But I'd much rather use the work skeptic. The latter word has an important outward looking component, objectivity. No matter how well the current crowd may do we will still need and value the skeptics.

Success for the new administration is not a given. And if it is achieved it should certainly not be the basis for any kind of new ideology. If you look at other posts of mine you will see that I reject most ideologies as a general rule and see little good place for them in modern government.

I suppose we could stretch the meaning of ideology to include any orderly plan, statement of intent, positional statement or even a habit. I prefer the definition "ideological - of or pertaining to or characteristic of an orientation that characterizes the thinking of a group or nation". Common in the remarks of present day pundits are the characterization of Obama's cabinet choices as people with strongly held views and strong personalities. This does not have the sounds of an ideology.

For me, the intention to operate in a manner different from the past (you can call it progressive, I suppose) does not constitute an ideology.

Ed Weldon

Ed,

Progressive is a euphamism for marxist/socialist, which is a political idiology.

Getting back to the original question, I think one big "fork in the road" change a lot of us will face is the new "hot" technologies and how engineers should view their future careers. We've been watching the future growth of energy and infrastructure work poking its nose over the horizon of a plain filled with computers, electronics, software and consumer products. Behind that nose is a good sized body filled with potential government stimulants. I think it portends well for the careers of civil engineers as well as the other engineer types:

Mechanical engineers who are up on their engineering fundamentals and who may have experience in the world of large machinery or power conversion or who have worked in the world of civil engineers.

Sparkies (an affectionate term that ME's use to describe the EE's) who understand system design, control technology or the electric power industry.

Chemical engineers with experience in large physical scale chemical processes and again are up on their fundamentals.

Any engineering professional with manufacturing experience.

Any of the above who are interested in a career in government service or the military. (I suspect we are fairly done with "wars of choice" for a while so the chances of getting shot at are diminishing).

Any engineer with an interest in and an aptitude for sales and marketing.

One other thought I have is that the careers of engineers in the world of biomedical engineering may start to slow as our society comes to grips with the difficulty of providing the best of the best medical care to every person and the ability of people to pay top dollar for "out of plan" expensive medical services and drugs. Hopefully for you specialists with some biochemistry experience there will be new opportunities as researchers prove the efficacy of adapting biological and biochemical science to energy conversion.

Ed Weldon

I think at this point that with the stated goal of improving infrastructure that civil (bridges, roads, buildings) and electrical engineering (communications, surveillance) may be the hottest technical areas for government money and potentially central planning, with all the good and bad that will entail. A lot of social engineering will probably be done with various technical types in supporting roles.

I think we have another "war of choice" approaching on the near horizon - the civil war in South Sudan/Darfur. Barak has shown great interest in US involvement in the past, and it won't take much UN arm-twisting to get us in as deep as we are in Iraq/Afghanistan. The UN may call it peacekeeping, but it will undoubtedly involve armored combat vehicles, armed helicopters, and of course automatic weapons and grenade launchers. My prediction as a former defense analyst is that it will be viewed as another US occupation by the local population, even though the media and elites will call it a humanitarian mission. It will be as difficult to get out as Iraq, Afghanistan, Kosovo, Bosnia, Haiti etc. as we will enter with no clearly defined exit strategy, as always.

I hope you are wrong on this war of choice (the civil war in South Sudan/Darfur). Hasn't history taught us that these "foreign adventures" produce little of value?

No, I guess not. Myopia lies deep in democracy's genes.

Ed Weldon

Sadly it runs deep in ALL countries genes. Perhaps the kind of personalities that seek great power are too narcissistic to believe that they have limits on what they can do.