(Do-gooders? Rice University Bioengineering Lab. Photo: CC Ed Schipul)

The engineering professional association IEEE reports that engineers are fairing well.

Good for them.

But to say they are “doing well by doing good” is laughable, generally speaking.

The Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers cites technologists working on “solar energy and search engines, cellphones and fuel cells, DNA sequencing and Hollywood blockbusters,” as fairly pathetic examples of do-gooding.

The IEEE goes on in this bit (below) to admit that aerospace and defense, and consumer electronics, are actually the industries keeping engineers in good stead.

IEEE Spectrum: Engineers Are Doing Well by Doing Good
This rise in starting salaries would be even higher were companies not able to get young talent from such places as India, China, and Romania. The U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics projects that over the next decade, EE ­employment will grow much more slowly than other ­engineering areas, because of the job outflux to other ­countries.