But the money certainly does make a difference. I have heard many times over many years that the us needs more engineers and fewer lawyers. The marketplace disagrees, routinely compensating easier careers more than engineering ones, both in dollars and prestige. We can, and do, hire foreign born engineers (rather than lawyers), which reduces the demand and pay for those born here. I personally know a us born, young physics grad from USC, having difficulty finding work. Neither the governmnet or private industry sees any shortage of engineers and scientists - when they do, the salaries will reflect it.

At the college where I taught, typical number of qualified and overqualified people applying for a position in English or Poli Sci--200 to 300. Typical number of qualified applicants for a position open in engineering technology--Zero.

The M.B.A. degree, which I earned back in 1965, when it meant something, is now just a piece of paper that allegedly certifies that you can maybe do bookkeeping and simple financial ratios. The universities are grinding them out like sausages, because there are far far too many people with A.B. degrees in business (an easy major), and in an attempt to separate the wheat from the chaf, it now seems as if to get an entry level job the M.B.A. stands about where a high school diploma did in 1950. While I'm on a rant about MBAs, look at all those Harvard MBAs who created Enron and others who eagerly encourged our biggest banks to lend tens of billions of dollars to South American countries that will never be paid back.

This unending escalation of credentialism creates jobs for otherwise unemployable professors, but all that most college degrees certify (notable exceptions being math-heavy areas such as engineering) is that you are not utterly lazy nor do you have an I.Q. much below Forrest Gump's, and you probably spend less than a third of your time in a drug-induced stupor.

Thank you, I feel much better now;-)
 

When we really need more engineers, the price for them will go up.  A half decade or so later, we'll have them.

Maybe in the past, this would have been true.  Will it be true in the post-carbon age?  I doubt it.

Will anyone's salary go up?  Companies will not be hiring or giving out raises when the economy tips into recession...or worse.  If the government weren't drowning in red ink, they might launch a "man on the moon" project for energy.  But they are drowning in red ink, and won't get any better post-peak.  They'll have a lot of other things to spend their money on, like relocating New Orleans residents, paying unemployment and food stamp benefits, and building up the military.

Tainter argues that technology, like any other human problem-solving method, eventually faces diminishing returns.  We have been getting less and less return for our investment in technology for several decades now, and I suspect peak oil will only accelerate it.  When the economy's bad and few jobs are available, how many families will pay $100,000 or more to send their kid to college?  They will never make that up, especially when you consider the four (or more) years of lost wages the student will also be giving up.  Many bright, capable students are already being forced to forgo college because they can't afford it.