According to the Wall Street Journal, manufacturing could be the place to be for a decent-paying job and low unemployment. An article in today’s Journal points to the fact that chemical plant and system operators top the manufacturing wage scale at a $55, 900 median wage. Unemployment in manufacturing is now running at 4%, compared to the 5.1% for the economy at large.
Another observation from the article: “Another big growth area is in process-control skills needed for such industries as food, pharmaceuticals and chemicals. New petrochemical plants in Texas and Louisiana will spur demand for those skills.”
For the entire article and charts, go here.
Hat tip to Terry McMahon, long-time Control columnist for the link. In his email to Paul Studebaker he said, "When I entered the field 54 years ago, process control was a tiny specialized niche which you couldn't find with a microscope in most ChE curricula. The process operators regarded control specialists as nuisances who only made their jobs more difficult. You've come a long way baby!"
