I forgot to point out that it is more than looking at the initial job offering vs graduates.

The % hired into similarly named job positions is not as high as expected.

But engineering graduates still have placement into other fields, and those jobs they take, in order to be employed.

So, it is not a dead-end degree at all.

Other difficulties come later.

One is placement of existing engineers.

In a couple companies, I witnessed mid-level, or higher, positions often filled by non-US engineers, brought in for the positions.

They were already employed as engineers in their respective homelands, and were good at their jobs.

Too often, they were brought in to fill positions that were therefore not filled by promotion from within.  

The other was that of replacement.

As was explained to us, the company would continue to lay-off the "bottom 10%", based on performance reviews.

Although at face value, this was thought to be somewhat reasonable.

However, after the first few times, the remaining engineers were all previously in the upper 90%.

But, no matter what, there was always going to be a "bottom 10%".

By then, the "bottom 10%" of the remaining engineers were not bad engineers at all, nor were they slackers.

Also, new hires generally worked very hard, and usually didn't find themselves in the "bottom 10%" ratings too often.

Then there was the need for the replacement of the laid-off engineers.

Some were replacement engineers brought in from other countries.

A final phenomena was in regard to age distribution.

As engineers approached 50, or older, they did their best to not find themselves in the "bottom 10%".

But over time, different departments somehow ended up with similarly aged people coalesced in them.

Sometimes an entire department was deemed as not fitting the company's future vision.

The entire department would be shutdown, resulting in the layoff of most of the department.

Then there would be the financial enhancement of special bridging for retirement benefits offered to them.

The only catch would be a signed agreement not to sue for age discrimination.

With the entire department gone, the company then had need and room for replacement engineers.

Some could be brought in from other countries, into restructured departments.

Those older engineers generally had higher salaries, so the difference to younger replacement salaries, helped offset some transfer costs.

So, not all conservative engineers will cheer everything that Daddy Warbucks is trying to convince Donald Trump about.

Particularly regarding H1-B visas for engineers.

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