Social status of Professionals in your countries

I am curious as to the source of your desperation? Unlike which cabbies? Cabbies can make a decent living in the US.

The beauty of the USA is that it's up to you to decide which "status" you want to be because the oppotunities are unlimited. My mother and father were mill workers with minimal formal education yet I was able to go to a Community College and a University on my own volition without a scholorship. I went on the G.I. bill. In this country there are many ways one can better oneself. Thats why we love it so much!

Well in my countries, opportunities are either bleak or none. I am a co-owner of a small plastic extrusion & recycling business here. Economic and political instability has forced me to search for greener pasture overseas. I feel that me and my country cannot offer a bright future for my family.

And if by any chance you guys would know of anyone who's willing to hire me, with expertise in small extrusion profiles, please email me.

this is a desperate move i have decided upon in order to provide for my family.

In Australia you would be middle class, in price range of $85.000 to $200.000 depending on type of engineer mining here is the highest paid.

And also plenty of jobs if your English is good.

A A Arnold Be Mba Jp

If you want social status, you picked the wrong profession.

@ silver ghost: i never did consider social status. I may have been misinterpreted. Anyways, i also might have posted on the wrong forum or made a wrong comment. Sorry for that.

@guest: I am trying Australia and NZ. I am lookin for a country where hopefully, i could bring my family in the future.

Back to the topic.

My country is a situation where our economy is dictated by the upper social class who have strong ties with the government.

You could do worse than Australia - good employment prospects all round and desperate for engineers at present...

Have a look at http://www.careerone.com.au - on any day there will be 1000 ish well paid engineering jobs on offer.

Having lived & worked in Asia I know exactly what you are concerned about with the social class system and ties to government and economy - fear not - Australia is nothing like this. Things are generally above board - there is often good government support for investors if you are wishing to start up manufacture here (except for in the alternative energy sector, but we've just had a change of government which might change that).

There is very little resistance to moving through class barriers (less so than America) - professionals are not automatically respected - however you will be respected if you treat people well, and the middle class covers about 85% of the population. Human rights are generally taken extremely seriously (with the odd glaring exception over the past decade that a quick Google search will fill you in on).

Immigrants are accepted (I mean socially) on their merits (apart from the odd racist ratbag - but they are the same everywhere) and there are large numbers of just about every race on earth living very happily together. There are large Filipino communities scattered throughout the major cities and you would probably find a few blogs where you could fire any questions you have about their experiences.

Your kids will get an excellent free education, from 5 years old right through to PhD (university is free up front for citizens, then a portion must be paid back through taxes once your income level reaches a certain thresh-hold).

Living standards are about the best in the world, taxes take about 30% directly and perhaps 40% indirectly of everything you earn. There is free medical available (also highly paid medical available if you choose) for every Australian, This is paid for by a 1.5% levy on everybody's income.

Food is wonderful - huge Asian influence so noodle bars / Thai / Vietnamese / Chinese / laksa ... those are everywhere (particularly the major cities.)

Come!

Thanks RobertOz. I 've checked out the site. Though almost all the jobs require that either you are a resident or already eligible to work, i did try my luck and applied to jobs that i am qualified. Though taxes, as you mentioned seemed expensive, but with all the benefits given by the government, it should probably be justified unlike here where cost cutting means lower paying jobs and tax evasion. Thanks for the replies. I hope i can make it there and hear from you soon.

Good luck! And by the way the tax thing was cumulative- ie I meant 30% directly, and about 10% indirectly (through sales tax / land tax / stamp duties / local council rates etc etc) - so about 40% to 50%% total (not 70%). Still high - slightly higher than the US I think.

By the way - I'm not sure if they are hiring or if it's your area, but I noticed this today: http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2007/12/09/2113702.htm

Might be an opening there for an extrusions expert...

If you want to be the max of the upwardly mobile, get a BS is some field, then go for your Ms in business. These are the guys that create companies. These are the guys you want to be with if you're looking for bucks!!!

I sincerely hope that you understand the words you use.

Bucks? Let's face it. You probably wouldn't be in your position right now if it weren't for "bucks". I'm simply trying to express my thoughts without insulting anyone. I guess probably i have marked you indirectly. For whatever case it might be, I'm not sorry for that.

Nelson,

The name calling was meant as a joke! I apologize if it sounded as if I was chastising you. Now, however, I will impart some true wisdom to you...

I have a friend that did very well through school. His grades were good enough to get him into the university he was interested in. When asked by his councilor what he wanted to take his degree in, my friend asked, "What currently pays the most?" His councilor told him EEs were doing very well, to which my friend said "That's what I want to be." Mind you, this friend of mine had never showed even the slightest bit of interest whatsoever in anything electrical or computer-oriented.

As it went, college was a drudge for my friend and he barely made it through at the bottom of his class. Next, he entered the job market, where he found no satisfaction. He drifted from one job to another, each requiring the talents of an EE, but he never found satisfaction in his work. To this day, while he makes good money, my friend's life is just one, long boring drudge.

The rich man is rich because he can afford to do what really excites him. This is just advice, and you can take it or leave it as you will: You are far better off learning and becoming a person of passion regarding what you do than if you settle just for money. Money, in itself gets boring - and jobs, being what they are, will eat up most of your time. Money and passion are not mutually exclusive, but you need to think it over for yourself - what do you really want to be doing for most of your life.

I hope you chose well for yourself. Good luck.

And some of us are even lucky enough to get to go to "work" each day and "play" with big expensive "toys" paid for by someone else! I count myself fortunate that my profession pays me to do the things I would just do as a hobby anyway. I think many engineers and most of the really good ones feel this way.

Got it. I may have been too sensitive. I apologize for that.

I can see your point. Money isn't what makes people happy. It can only buy you a smile, but never happiness. But my problem is, how can i be happy in my situation where i see no bright future for my kids? That's why i still chose to apply on the career that i have taken. And that i am not happy anymore in my country.

I guess it applies the same for the author's story. As parents, we strive hard to give our kids a brighter future. That makes us happy. And only then do we soon realize that such a future is inexistent.

I am making my move as early as i can before i age.

You're getting it: If making a better future for your children makes you happy, then...

A Guru (Sanskrit: गुरू), is a teacher in Hinduism, Buddhism, and Sikhism, as well as in many new religious movements. The guru is seen in these religions as a sacred conduit for wisdom and a way to self-realization, and the importance of finding a true guru is emphasized

I said what needed to be said. Now, it's back to contemplating my naval.

sheep

But coming from the Silicon Valley, I thot all you needed there was to be a computer geek!

@ silver ghost: Hehe! I'm from Philippines.

The job prospects are very good in the USA for any nationality. I live in Montana in the Northwest and it's basically rural. Our neighbors are anything from professors, doctors, lawyers to truck drivers, garbage collectors, mill workers and farmers. If you get along with your neighbors and have respect for them, they'll have respect for you. My friends are rich and poor, poorly educated and very educated but we sit and visit and even eat together. Those are my everyday friends.

There are some of the people with racial attitudes and biases, but not too many of them.

In the bigger cities you'll find more divisions where the rich are separated from the poor, the educated from the non-educated, and the social elite (read Hollywood type movie actors and the extreme wealthy) who think they are better than anyone. I even have friends who are engineers. But by and large you'll fit in just about anywhere you want to fit in and thats determined by your own attitude. You pretty well have to work for what you get.

I probably didn't give a real good description, but that's about how I see it from where I live. There are others in this forum who can give you their perspective from where they live.

Randy

I am a retired chemical engineer from Ohio, living in the so-called "Rust Belt". I would have to say that job prospects in engineering in this area are quite bleak. Saying that, I also realize that is not the case in all parts of the country (USA). I understand that small engineering companies making specialized products for the medical fields are doing well here as are some plastics manufacturers, but any heavy manufacturing (steel and mining) type engineering is nearly non-existant in this general area.

I think it is very sad that your country is like that. In free and democratic societies your family background means very little and who you are as a person and what you can do really is most important. Your ability allows you to earn what you are worth. What class you are in depends on how you live and how much money you choose to spend.

There are rich people who drink, curse, fight and treat people badly, some people call them upper class [or Hollywood stars], but they are just low class people with money. There are poorer people who are honest, friendly, peaceable and who treat others well, they are classy people who don't have money and the kind of people you want as friends. There are also rich people who are nice and unconcerned with "class". Engineers as a group do not belong to any particular social class or status in the English speaking countries as it is our heritage to value the individual, not the group he was born into or his family history.

I hope you can make your goals and even more I hope you can return home and break the chains of class and social status for others.

Thankyou people for the response. I've done B.E. in Electrical Engg. and deciding to do M.Engg. in Power Systems from abroad. Yes I'm getting a picture of all this, but I think it would help me more if I give you an actual example from my country.

For eg. a Trainee Engineer in any 'good' engg. firm here, gets an equivalent of US$166-250 per month. A Senior Engineer may get US$833-1333/mnth while a Chief Engineer may get more or less US$2500/mnth with additional company benefits (like a car, medical, share in utility bills & sometimes even gasoline). Now what I want to know is that with this kind of salary in your country, would you consider yourself financially sound, mediocre, or just right?

And btw, any one getting $2500/mnth here, life is smooth.

waiting for more replies...thanx

Engineers in the US will typically make more than $2500 per month when coming out of college, however I'm not sure how this compares with your country's cost of living. $2500 a month in the US could be lived on but it would probably be considered lower class. Having a house with that salary might be difficult depending on where you lived. Generally, you will be provided with health insurance, however in the US that doesn't always mean that you get the best medical care. Typically, "perks" like a car allowance are given to engineers or others that travel a lot and have to cover a wide area (a good example for me was the water engineers that covered all of east Texas).

Finally, I agree with the other posters, find what makes you happy and do that for a living. Money doesn't buy you happiness...

That's coming out of college. Even brand new teachers make about that much in many places.

You may start out with humble beginnings with a degree but as you gain seniority your paycheck will grow substantially within a few years.

I'm in California. The company I work for is privately owned by a French family and the owner lives in France, which is where the parent company is located.

I work in the engineering department and we have guy who is from the Philippines, who is an engineer, working here.

The United States is an Equal Opportunity Employer, as long as you have proper authorization to work here, no one really cares where you are from.

There are some places that might have an issue but for the most part as long as you show that you have the qualifications and make a good impression at the interviews you shouldn't have any problems.

What you have to look into is the unemployment levels for each area because that will reflect just how available the job market is.

Generally the unemployment rate is much higher for non-college graduates then it is for college graduates but it's the higher unemployment rate that is made most available to the public.

Generally most of your engineering positions aren't made public, you usually have to contact a company that deals with the field that you are proficient with by sending a resume and calling and asking if they have any openings.

As for employment packages. Each company offers their own package. Some offer none at all.

They all have to provide medical/dental insurance and pay for a portion of it. Most of them offer a retirement package of some kind. Some retirement packages are much better then others.

I have a BS in physics but currently work in an engineering capacity for a Fortune 50 company in upstate NY. I make about $3000 a month (USD) after taxes in essentially an entry level position. That translates to roughly $50,000 a year pre-tax. My father works in another division of the same Fortune 50 company in NH and makes in the neighborhood of $70,000-$80,000/yr, but has no college degree and has worked his way up to there over the course of roughly 20 years with the company (started out as a machinist, and is now a process design engineer). I would consider us both to be both middle class because while its true he makes considerably more then I do, my mortgage is less expensive and my property taxes are lower then his (although he pays no state income tax), and I have no children.

The atmosphere of the company we work for is fairly relaxed, my division more so then his, but all employees enjoy excellent benefits packages. The company is very in tune with worker satisfaction, health and safety. Some of those things I don't know how you can traslate into dollars, but they should be considerations.

Career growth is entirely up to you around here, but pay grade will vary from company to company.

I'm a PE and own my own small, low-profile, consultancy. Employ 3 people,

and make enuff money to be comfortably "middle class," by income.

However, I noted that you said

"

My country is a situation where our economy

is dictated by the upper social class

who have strong ties with the government."

It's exactly the same here in the U S of A,

although we pretend it's not.

==============

As for "social status", most good field engineers I know

simply do not give a good god damn. It's quite enough

to know what the F you are talking about to give you

a feeling of "OK"-ness: what that SOB over there in the

$2,000 suit thinks of you is HIS business, and I really

do not give a rats butt.

====================

You know English well enough! Put your resume on line,

and if you know your stuff, you'll get offers. Ever since

the current occupant of the White House clamped down on

all those University Educated Terrorists (YEAH!) we've had a deficit

of imported brains to hire.

==============

^{Damn, we (the USA) are STOOOpid.}

I support this message.

Some day, you'll laugh yourself to death!

hi,

i need your comments on my situation. i am juz graduated in Mech eng and planning to get PE.i already worked i a engineering cosultant company, i heard that this job area is more suitable to gain experience to get PE, i just wondering is it too soon and worth for me to get it since i still young?can u please give your opinion about this?

Tell you what, tells us again how much a good senior engineer makes in your country, then very specifically break down how much one has to pay for the basic stuff of living...

• home - type, size
• auto
• gas
• food
• utilities
• TV, radio, stuff like that
• communications - phone, Internet

Then we can create a ratio between money made and money spent.

I get the feeling that the cost of living is vastly different between our countries. Creating this ratio should provide a perspective that we can use as a comparison.

Nice. Cost of living vs income.

I'll even add the cost of raising a child, and the cost of his/her education.