But John, journalists have to evaluate situations and people, separate the facts from the opinions and form a hypothesis. Then they have to document their findings, and often add their own slant or opinion. Finally, they have to create a tag line that will draw in their audience and possibly even some new readers. All of this with the daily, weekly, monthly etc. deadline perspective of their publisher. Oh, wait a minute. Engineers have to do all that to, although not as frequently, or we would never get our work done. It's a good thing they made us take technical writing to help condense what might otherwise be extremely long, technically oriented presentations. Although after reading some white papers, I think more than a few engineers skipped tech writing. The difference is that engineers have to do all that in the pursuit of making something other than the documentation itself. We are also trained in statistics, and the first day of class my Math-PHD professor explained that there are 3 kinds of stats; little lies, big lies, and damn lies. Statistics are used to make your viewpoint seem better than the opposing one, so you choose the statistics or ask the question in a way that provides the correct answer. The stats you used make a lot of sense to me. 1] Look at pay scale and consider what's at stake if you screw up, and the decreasing demand for journalists. 2] I'm actually not at all, but without sounding too sexist, women are quite smart. I would put up with more crap from a spouse bring home 6 figures of bacon than I would one who brings home less than a journalist's starting pay. 3] Trust is a very strange thing indeed, because people will give it freely to one total stranger and not another simply because of that strangers occupation. I've found that there are both trustworthy and untrustworthy people in every field mentioned. Possibly not distributed in a bell curve, but they are still there. 4] Who wouldn't be happy in a field were; doing something wrong is how you learn, and then you get to fix it the right way; where you don't have to lie to your constituents or customers to keep you job; where you feel that there is good in what you are doing, maybe not as good as fixing and protecting people, but good. As far as what else engineers do better? Well, a gentleman doesn't discuss such matters. I really love the story about GM Orion assy plant, but don't beat yourself up over it. If you did the same thing with engineers you would have wouldn't have any quality errors, crashing, or mishaps. You WOULD have; 6 different methods of organizing parts, 4 CYA questions regarding the most likely quite clear instructions, 18 minutes of heated bickering over who had the best way to assembly the car, followed by, 2 minutes of finger pointing. All without ever starting to assemble the first car. Don't take all this the wrong way, I still think engineering is way better than journalism, for me. It's good that you used the Cubs as a baseline, because the Eagles already took care of Hell Freezing Over.

As a journalism grad who edits reports that sometimes use some pretty heavy engineering language, I was amused by these survey results. (I started out in magazine publishing, then moved into marketing communications, then finally environmental consulting.) One of my co-workers, in another office, is also a Medill grad; I think we experience the best and worst of both journalism and engineering. With a fairly recent merger, I started running across more straight engineering-speak. Phew. Who says journalism grads aren’t good at translating foreign languages?!

-Julie Nichols, senior technical editor, AECOM Design + Planning

You know that I'm an engineer at heart and college friend from way back. I do like and agree with your article. Finally, an argument that I can win with the appropriate digital documentation in place as evidence. I have noticed over my career that people tend to measure themselves against what they have not accomplished or what other people have within the same time period. Average levels of pay and satisfaction do not take into account the outliers; those of your profession whose achievements surpasses the hopes of any in the engineering practice. Taking the big swing is what journalism is all about; just ask Sammy Sosa. Also, the engineering profession, in and of itself, is difficult to sustain (in my opinion) over a period of many years. Have you ever met an engineer close to retirement with a daily smile on his face? The ones that I have met seem pretty grumpy. 15+ years ago I found myself in a discussion/argument with a follow professional over the pitch requirements of a screw thread that was being designed into one of our products and thought "do I really want to be doing this 3 years from now?"

Although I have made a good living in journalism for 35 years, I can't argue with this finding, because the number of fields where engineers and other technical people are in demand is growing while the media and its business model are shrinking. Very few of the college-age children of my colleagues are studying journalism or even law or liberal arts. Those who are earning degrees in technical fields have no trouble at all finding jobs or securing multiple job offers. My nephew is about to finish Virginia Tech with qualifications in environmental engineering. He will not be begging some newspaper to hire him for $300 a week.

-Jeff Kosnett, senior editor, Kiplinger Washington Editors

I also made a living in journalism, but there are so many people who want to write, some will even do it for nothing and have been doing so for a long time. The narcissistic age we live in has made information, opinion, or opinion disguised as journalism a fairly cheap commodity.

Also, the media companies big enough to pay a living wage have not been very astute at managing their intellectual property. They’re more interested in disseminating information than they are in figuring out how they’ll get paid for a product worth buying.

These afflictions have not affected engineers. It hasn’t occurred to them to work for nothing, even the ones I’ve known who have been out of work. We desperately need more U.S. citizens scoring better in math and taking up the hard sciences, so the trend away from assuming one will have remunerative career opportunities in the liberal arts and the law is probably a good thing.

As much as I love my lawyer friends and family, we do not need more attorneys, except for those willing to help the poor. As for a resultant decline in the arts... Bach had a “day job” for years teaching math and Latin. Engineers are largely responsible for the better-faster-sleeker-stronger-cooler, lower maintenance, cheaper, must-have products we like to buy (almost none of which seem to be made here and possibily fewer and fewer designed here). And-face it-we humans are mostly materialists, even many of those who somehow think they’re not as they dive into their free-range chicken or day-boat scallops. I’d rather pay for fancy new kitchen gadgets than a new blog.

-John Cline, communications strategist, New York

Having been both an engineer and a journalist, I’d have to say that engineering pays much more, while journalism is much more fun. The ideal job is one that you’re passionate about, that you do well, and that pays well. Finding such a job is much easier said than done and I’m still trying!

-Clark Robinson, program manager, Dell Inc., Austin, TX

I now advise the student workers in my office at a liberal arts college to strongly consider a plan B career and training that is technical is some way-even a trade. The furnace company I just called charges $155 to do a yearly tune-up that takes less than an hour. That’s six times what I make as a writer/editor of the alum magazine. Am I happier and more satisfied in my job than he is? Hmmm....

-Mieke Bomman, associate editor, Mount Holyoke College, Springfield, MA