Stimulus didn’t account for engineering work

Regarding the recent article, about the stimulus building projects not creating employment: I guess the Washington politicians thought that the day after they passed the stimulus bill the construction of new roads, highways and bridges would begin and our unemployment problem would start improving. They forgot one major item, engineering.

To upgrade America's rundown highway systems and bridges requires an enormous amount of engineering work. Namely, planning, surveying, local and state approvals, preparing drawings and specifications, awarding construction contracts and assembling a construction work force that can complete this heavy duty work. This process can take years before any meaningful work can be started.

One major problem to getting this preliminary engineering work accomplished is that America's education systems are not graduating enough engineers to meet the demands of our technical society. Our schools started tinkering with mathematics in the 1960s, trying new teaching methods to simplify it, and we went downhill from there.

Remember, the engineers and scientists who put men on the moon and returned them safely to Earth in 1969 received their education in the 1930s and 1940s.

Ralph Bock

Cedar Rapids