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> And aerospace engineers are dirt cheap. I suspect you're letting your software world experience dictate your expectations of what engineering is all about, a

by nuerow 5y ago

> And aerospace engineers are dirt cheap. I suspect you're letting your software world experience dictate your expectations of what engineering is all about, and what it takes to actually get work done. Software development is a rare field where the only relevant resource is man hours. In other fields, including aerospace engineering, trained meat bags tend to have a negligible cost to the point where replacing a whole engineering team might be a minor inconvenience. However, crashing a prototype is a project killer due to cost alone.

lazide 5y ago
It sounds a whole lot like you’re agreeing with me - but seem to think you’re not?
- notahacker 5y ago
  I believe the OP's point is that if you're not just using engineers to audit the tests Boeing does, then additional engineers are a fraction of the cost of running a full parallel aerospace test programme. The capex to set up the test infrastructure is significant even if Boeing is legally obliged to supply you with prototypes to destroy at no cost (which obviously has an impact on the amount of R&D Boeing is willing to do). Also, you're not hiring from a diversely employed Valley pool: most of the engineers with the requisite level of understanding to test Boeing's hardware work for Boeing (and to an extent its supply chain), which might mean you don't have to offer them much of a pay rise, but it also means [i] you're weakening the engineering capability of the firms actually designing and building the stuff by poaching them and [ii] their views on what's safe and what's an appropriate level of testing aren't fully independent anyway.
  - lazide 5y ago
    Eh, that doesn’t sound like it? 1) Boeing lays off thousands of aerospace engineers regularly (they did as part of the max disaster), and doesn’t rehire them all back - the industry is highly cyclical, and Boeing is periodically shifting locations anyway 2) the stated concern was Boeing brass was applying undue influence to engineering correct? If those folks worked for the FAA directly after being laid off , wouldn’t they be more than happy to stick it to Boeing brass if they were telling them to cut corners? 3) we’re talking design overview and identifying where Boeing (or others) may be ‘putting their finger on the scale’ or trying to snow regulators by asserting bogus test results or designing tests that they can pass by not including important test criteria they may not pass right? That is certainly something an engineer who was previously in the industry would be aware of, or even a independent engineer should be capable of spotting from ‘the outside’ - and require they do. 4) at (linked in a parallel thread) a median salary of $118k, which is well within something the feds could cover, the FAA can certainly afford to hire a non-token amount of aerospace engineers onto their staff if they actually wanted too/Congress wasn’t trying to kill them. This isn’t like hiring on a FAANG staff software eng for 700k or whatever which would cause outrage or break the pay scale, and this is for something for which there are clear large body counts that can be pointed at. Now if we want to say Congress has been strangling the FAA for a long time (like the IRS and USPS) and forcing them to outsource to industry or whatever, hey - I could believe it - but that is something that should be yelled from the rooftops because that can be fixed, and that will cost us a lot in blood. I don’t want more Americans dead due to corruption of a regulatory process, especially not my friends or family, and those are the stakes here.
    - nuerow 5y ago
      > Eh, that doesn’t sound like it? It should, as it was what I said. I'm really not sure if it's possible to make a point any clearer. > Boeing lays off thousands of aerospace engineers regularly (...) Sounds in line with the classical big corp style of management. I'm not sure what any of that has to do with humans not being the critical element of providing a service. In fact, are you sure you're not supporting the point you're trying to refute?
      - lazide 5y ago
        You said that the FAA would be causing brain drain - in a field where thousands get laid off all the time? And that Boeing would surely be exerting influence on them so they wouldn’t catch issues - after Boeing laid them off? And that it wouldn’t matter having competent engineers at the FAA because catching things require expensive tests - that the engineers if they existed at the FAA could mandate Boeing pay for, since they would know they needed them to do them? Huh? No one is saying the FAA should be running a full parallel aerospace program. I’m saying if they lack in house competency to call bullshit on what a player they are regulating is passing to them and relying on that player to just always do the right thing, then they are not effective regulators It would be like taking Facebooks word that they are totally being good privacy wise, and not having anyone available who understands internet tracking or adtech. Which, is of course another failing regulator (looking at you FTC), but at least that doesn’t get hundreds of people killed in giant fireballs?

by nuerow 5y ago

lazide 5y ago

It sounds a whole lot like you’re agreeing with me - but seem to think you’re not?

notahacker 5y ago
I believe the OP's point is that if you're not just using engineers to audit the tests Boeing does, then additional engineers are a fraction of the cost of running a full parallel aerospace test programme. The capex to set up the test infrastructure is significant even if Boeing is legally obliged to supply you with prototypes to destroy at no cost (which obviously has an impact on the amount of R&D Boeing is willing to do). Also, you're not hiring from a diversely employed Valley pool: most of the engineers with the requisite level of understanding to test Boeing's hardware work for Boeing (and to an extent its supply chain), which might mean you don't have to offer them much of a pay rise, but it also means [i] you're weakening the engineering capability of the firms actually designing and building the stuff by poaching them and [ii] their views on what's safe and what's an appropriate level of testing aren't fully independent anyway.
- lazide 5y ago
  Eh, that doesn’t sound like it? 1) Boeing lays off thousands of aerospace engineers regularly (they did as part of the max disaster), and doesn’t rehire them all back - the industry is highly cyclical, and Boeing is periodically shifting locations anyway 2) the stated concern was Boeing brass was applying undue influence to engineering correct? If those folks worked for the FAA directly after being laid off , wouldn’t they be more than happy to stick it to Boeing brass if they were telling them to cut corners? 3) we’re talking design overview and identifying where Boeing (or others) may be ‘putting their finger on the scale’ or trying to snow regulators by asserting bogus test results or designing tests that they can pass by not including important test criteria they may not pass right? That is certainly something an engineer who was previously in the industry would be aware of, or even a independent engineer should be capable of spotting from ‘the outside’ - and require they do. 4) at (linked in a parallel thread) a median salary of $118k, which is well within something the feds could cover, the FAA can certainly afford to hire a non-token amount of aerospace engineers onto their staff if they actually wanted too/Congress wasn’t trying to kill them. This isn’t like hiring on a FAANG staff software eng for 700k or whatever which would cause outrage or break the pay scale, and this is for something for which there are clear large body counts that can be pointed at. Now if we want to say Congress has been strangling the FAA for a long time (like the IRS and USPS) and forcing them to outsource to industry or whatever, hey - I could believe it - but that is something that should be yelled from the rooftops because that can be fixed, and that will cost us a lot in blood. I don’t want more Americans dead due to corruption of a regulatory process, especially not my friends or family, and those are the stakes here.
  - nuerow 5y ago
    > Eh, that doesn’t sound like it? It should, as it was what I said. I'm really not sure if it's possible to make a point any clearer. > Boeing lays off thousands of aerospace engineers regularly (...) Sounds in line with the classical big corp style of management. I'm not sure what any of that has to do with humans not being the critical element of providing a service. In fact, are you sure you're not supporting the point you're trying to refute?
    - lazide 5y ago
      You said that the FAA would be causing brain drain - in a field where thousands get laid off all the time? And that Boeing would surely be exerting influence on them so they wouldn’t catch issues - after Boeing laid them off? And that it wouldn’t matter having competent engineers at the FAA because catching things require expensive tests - that the engineers if they existed at the FAA could mandate Boeing pay for, since they would know they needed them to do them? Huh? No one is saying the FAA should be running a full parallel aerospace program. I’m saying if they lack in house competency to call bullshit on what a player they are regulating is passing to them and relying on that player to just always do the right thing, then they are not effective regulators It would be like taking Facebooks word that they are totally being good privacy wise, and not having anyone available who understands internet tracking or adtech. Which, is of course another failing regulator (looking at you FTC), but at least that doesn’t get hundreds of people killed in giant fireballs?