American Engineeraea.orgAEA looking for volunteersTo write for our publication!Editor neededSee: aea.org/americanEngineer.htmfor infoEngineering HumorEnjoy some Humor aboutA World without Engineers!★ All New AEA Content Managment System: AEA.org/CMS(★ Article archived: Friday April 13th, 2012)Engineer Surplus American Engineers Must Fight for SurvivalEngineering can and should be one of the finest, most interesting and challenging careers to pursue.  However, when one looks at the Engineer and STEM Supply/Demand Ratio and the level of work demanded of them it is easy to see a large surplus exists.Pitfalls: One of the significant problems facing engineers is Under-Utilization.1  If an engineer spends ten percent of his or her time doing engineering and the rest of their time doing support or non-engineering work they will, over a ten year period, accrue only one year of engineering experience.  This is a big step towards career destruction.  One has to recognize this early on with their first job.  Doing the same work repeatedly, year after year does not qualify as years of experience.  When a job makes little use of your education and skills you should be looking elsewhere.  With each job, you should be increasing your experience, knowledge and worth.Another important point:  Corporations\92 Human Resource people are looking for new employees with experience.  They want you to have done, in the past, what they expect you to be doing in their present or future.  Don\92t buy into the academic \93take this course and you will get a job\94.  Educators can guarantee nothing.  They can\92t even guarantee a quality education.Due to a surplus - and there is a surplus - an engineer can be washed out at thirty five to forty years of age. At one time, many thought this to be \93Age Discrimination\94; in reality, it was just \93Salary Discrimination\94.  Bean Counters give little consideration to the advantages of having senior engineers cultured by years of experience on their staff.  To them, the dollar is more important.Another path towards career destruction is the lack of professionalism and attention to the forces that are antagonistic to the Engineering career. By professionalism, I refer to the pride of being an engineer, the integrity, ethical behavior and satisfaction of solving problems and doing a good job.  I am also proud to have had the satisfaction of working with so many other engineers, manufacturing, and support people.  They were the people who made my life as an engineer such a pleasure and so rewarding.  You should all enjoy the same pleasures.  This is all very good, but job opportunity is also very important.  One cannot have this with an Engineer (STEM) surplus.Major forces that are antagonistic to the Engineering and STEM Professions are the government (NSF), the College Empire and Corporate America.  These three and the pseudo-professional engineering societies  driven by academia and the corporate managers have removed