Digger's Decline: A Fable for Civil Engineers

Abstract

A timely fable to encourage civil engineers to do what they are supposed to do best—think. The law of supply and demand was in full effect long before Adam Smith wrote so eloquently about the invisible hand of the market. The law is still with us, undiminished by the profession's denial. Civil engineering's continuing and compulsive predictions of engineering shortages and fervent recruiting have contributed to an oversupply of engineers, depressed salaries, and extremely destructive price competition. These conditions make high standards of creativity, excellence in design, and fully ethical and professional conduct impractical for many who want to stay in business, or stay employed. Recruiting students partly on the basis of shortages that never happen raises additional and unaddressed ethnical considerations. Recruiting should be stopped. Public relations efforts are simply embarrassing and irrelevant. This simple fable is offered in the hope that it will help the profession take a fresh look at the question of supply and demand for civil engineers.