07.29.06

Where Did All the Engineers Go?

Posted in Technology at 12:03 pm by Jason G.

I’ve certainly read a lot about how America will quickly be subsumed by the vast number of Indian and Chinese knowledge workers… Quit incorrect, Fuqua researchers have found. There are quite a few problems with the numbers being bandied about, in fact most of them are just plain wrong. Here’s a quote:

One would expect that the numbers used in such debate would be defensible and grounded. Yet researchers at Duke University have determined that some of the most cited statistics on engineering graduates are inaccurate. Statistics that say the U.S. is producing 70,000 engineers a year vs. 350,000 from India and 600,000 from China aren’t valid, the Duke team says.

…

We found that the U.S. was graduating 222,335 engineers, vs. 215,000 from India.

You can read more in the Business Week article or from the original research at Duke.