It’s happening with pretty much all professions. I’m a chemical engineer and it’s pretty much every role at my plant, the plan is just make everyone work so much they hate their lives, and then those people quit and make things worse for everyone else that’s left and it’s all fueled by an endless supply of fresh college grads who are just thrown into the deep end with the understanding that over half of them will get fed up and quit within a few years and those who stay will train the new ones coming in. It’s not just engineers, it’s operators, mechanics, maintenance coordinators, safety reps, anything you can think of. While technology technically allows fewer people to do the same work, that same work is just getting worse and worse because each employee has to do so many different types of things and have so much riding on them personally that they feel like they can’t leave or take any time off without messing up the whole operation - there is no redundancy.
Everyone I know in the chemical industry is saying the same thing. Everyone is overworked and wages for chemical engineers have been stagnant for the past 20 years in spite of inflation and each employee delivering much more productivity than they used to. I have started to envy the production line staff who at least get overtime pay and don’t have to think about this shit once they clock out. They just leave and it’s the next shift’s problem.
i wonder how many of those fresh graduates, i assume undergrad? has little to no experience are being hired, when i was searching most of them want 2-4+years of experience despite them saying they can “Accept less”.
i think biotech is similar.
i think the pool for graduates is dwindling in general trying to enter stem fields, because its so gatekept in biotech? i heard people with masters are having a tough time entering research in biotech too, alot of them seem to also play mind games with applicants, posting listings with no intention of hiring, at least one employer making up half of the listing in bio/research is known for doing this. we have CLS here in the west, apparently everyone wants to move here or go the only 9 schools with CLS programs(grad program), making it competitive asf, eventhough theres a shortage of them in the industry. and yes they are often skeleton crewed in these lab jobs too, more work on them while not loosening hiring methods of the shortage, more likely its the companies and hospitals trying to SAVE MONEY by cutting corners.
and theres cls techs too, plus all techs in research that are underrespresented. also the PHD pipeline is also has thier own enshittification too. some of them are so overworked and they left thier fields. people think faculty in academia is thier only stable career, but its quite competitive, as your CV will be reviewed by a PI of the department in a university. when i was still in a uni, the professor of the class had to waste a ton of time reviewing a ton of applicants.
It’s happening with pretty much all professions. I’m a chemical engineer and it’s pretty much every role at my plant, the plan is just make everyone work so much they hate their lives, and then those people quit and make things worse for everyone else that’s left and it’s all fueled by an endless supply of fresh college grads who are just thrown into the deep end with the understanding that over half of them will get fed up and quit within a few years and those who stay will train the new ones coming in. It’s not just engineers, it’s operators, mechanics, maintenance coordinators, safety reps, anything you can think of. While technology technically allows fewer people to do the same work, that same work is just getting worse and worse because each employee has to do so many different types of things and have so much riding on them personally that they feel like they can’t leave or take any time off without messing up the whole operation - there is no redundancy.
Everyone I know in the chemical industry is saying the same thing. Everyone is overworked and wages for chemical engineers have been stagnant for the past 20 years in spite of inflation and each employee delivering much more productivity than they used to. I have started to envy the production line staff who at least get overtime pay and don’t have to think about this shit once they clock out. They just leave and it’s the next shift’s problem.
i wonder how many of those fresh graduates, i assume undergrad? has little to no experience are being hired, when i was searching most of them want 2-4+years of experience despite them saying they can “Accept less”.
i think biotech is similar. i think the pool for graduates is dwindling in general trying to enter stem fields, because its so gatekept in biotech? i heard people with masters are having a tough time entering research in biotech too, alot of them seem to also play mind games with applicants, posting listings with no intention of hiring, at least one employer making up half of the listing in bio/research is known for doing this. we have CLS here in the west, apparently everyone wants to move here or go the only 9 schools with CLS programs(grad program), making it competitive asf, eventhough theres a shortage of them in the industry. and yes they are often skeleton crewed in these lab jobs too, more work on them while not loosening hiring methods of the shortage, more likely its the companies and hospitals trying to SAVE MONEY by cutting corners.
and theres cls techs too, plus all techs in research that are underrespresented. also the PHD pipeline is also has thier own enshittification too. some of them are so overworked and they left thier fields. people think faculty in academia is thier only stable career, but its quite competitive, as your CV will be reviewed by a PI of the department in a university. when i was still in a uni, the professor of the class had to waste a ton of time reviewing a ton of applicants.
Holy crap, that’s me! Just with heavy machinery.
I often wish my old job at Lidl back. I very often also regret buying a house that makes me reliant on a well-paying job.