Engineering and Information Technology Manpower utilization in the United States is in a state of flux. Overall engineering unemployment was 2.2% (49,000) in the first quarter of 1999. Employment was at a historic high level of 2,124,000, up 5,000 from the last quarter of 1998. Last year, the unemployment level was between 1.6 and 1.7% leaving the present higher level as an indicator of the easing of demand. There was a time when 3.2% unemployment was a crisis level (1971-72). Full employment for engineers was about 0.6% in 1965.

 

The BLS collects data on 13 subspecialties of engineering. Those are; Aerospace, Metallurgy, Mining, Petroleum, Chemical, Nuclear, Civil, Agricultural, Electrical-Electronic-Computer, Industrial, Mechanical, Marine and Not Elsewhere Classified. Of these, Electrical etc. is the largest subspecialty with a current 692,000 count. Engineers account for only 1.6% of workers in the current population survey conducted monthly and aggregated for quarterly data. The survey population is between 50,000 and 60,000 resulting in approximately 960 engineer responses per monthly survey at the most. That results in good data in the aggregate but for smaller specialties such as Mining and Agricultural with 4,000 workers in each, the employment sample for those are only 1.8 individuals, hardly a statistically useful sample size. Aggregating for quarterly data increases the sample by three times. When one considers the unemployment data at 2.2%, that is only 21 individuals. Aggregating it for the three months it is still only 63 individuals-useful but subject to statistical variations.

 

Electrical engineers had a record population of 692,000 in the first quarter of 1999. The survey count would have been 313. Unemployment however was at 1% indicating an unemployment number of 3.13 individuals that aggregated to 9.39 individuals counted during the quarter. During 1998, EE unemployment increased rapidly from 0.8% to 3.4% due to the delayed response to the Pacific Rim monetary problems. It just as rapidly decreased to 1% as EE’s quickly found employment in other economic sectors. The rapid rise in unemployment was predictable and was predicted. Another engineering specialty, Petroleum, with only 15,000 population did show enough variation in unemployment to indicate problems in the Oil Patch. The statistically invalid number was 26.7% and it indicated serious problems from the collapse of oil prices. Marine engineers with 19,000 population showed a statistically invalid increase to 12.3% as exports to the Pacific Rim collapsed.

 

Information Technology employment is showing signs of some problems. last year, Programmer unemployment averaged 1.4% and Computer Science employment averaged 1.3% The first quarter of this year showed Computer Science and Programmer unemployment at the 1.9% level. Computer Science unemployment had been increasing quarterly from 1.1%, 1.3%, 1.7% and then the 1.9% The trend is a statistically valid indicator of developing oversupply.