Environmental Engineering as Care for Human Welfare and Planetary Health

Abstract

Among the sub-disciplines of engineering, environmental engineering is distinctive in three aspects. First, descriptions of the profession of environmental engineering emphasize that environmental engineers solve problems to prevent harm, which typically is an important motivation for taking a job in care work. Second, the percentage of degrees awarded to women is highest for environmental among all sub-disciplines of engineering (i.e., 53.3% of bachelor's degrees, 46.3% of master's degrees, and 43.6% of doctoral degrees in environmental engineering conferred in 2020 were awarded to women). Third, median salaries for environmental engineerscontrolling for other variablesare lowest among engineering subdisciplines (i.e., $82,036 per year in 2019), despite high levels of educational attainment and training. Our analysis of environmental engineers working in the United States strongly suggests that the profession of environmental engineering is highly susceptible to what is known as the care penalty. The care penalty is a function of market dynamics, which tend to undervalue work that generates substantial unpriced benefits for others. The care penalty often is observed in jobs characterized by high levels of intrinsic motivation, such as concern for human welfare.Additional data would be useful to further evaluate the care penalty in environmental engineering in other countries. To address the care penalty, we do not suggest that environmental engineers should become less caring. Rather environmental engineers should be aware of this potential economic risk and seek to mitigate the care penalty in two specific ways.First environmental engineers should encourage life-cycle principles and environmental fullcost accounting in order to increase fungibility among different measures of the components of the triple bottom line of people (i.e., human welfare), planet (i.e., planetary health), and prosperity (i.e., financial gain). Second, environmental engineers should clearly demonstrate the unique contributions that technically skilled commitments to human welfare can generate.We suggest that a greater awareness of these issues could build on and strengthen growing public concerns regarding environmental sustainability. Finally, we suggest that distinctive attributes of environmental engineering may prove critical to unlocking growth in the engineering workforce as care for human welfare and planetary health.

Comparing oranges versus grapes as a metaphor of the nurse+engineer

“…Both nurses and engineers share a professional obligation to help people to live within the sustainable bounds of planetary ecosystems while promoting the equitable distribution of resources to support health and wellness for the most vulnerable (Oerther, 2021). Nursing, for most of its existence, as well as engineering, increasingly, can be characterised as ‘caring professions’ where the practitioner assumes a responsibility to listen attentively to another person with nonjudgemental acceptance for the purpose of providing comfort in‐line with the autonomous preference of the individual, family, community or public‐at‐large (Oerther et al, forthcoming).…”

Did the NAE Changing the Conversation Campaign Introduce the Care Penalty into Engineering?

“…While the analysis by Kuehn and Salzman [9] provided a correlation among salaries and sex, our recent work explored this question with greater granularity [10]. First, we reported a thematic analysis of the language used in environmental engineering as compared to the language common in professions that are believed to suffer from a care penalty (i.e., nursing).…”

“…And third, we specifically looked for the presence of a "care penalty" independent of sex (i.e., we deconflated salaries for sex, and explored the correlation of salary among engineering sub-disciplines both for male and for female). A detailed analysis of the engineering labor market is beyond the scope of this article, and the reader is encouraged to consider the data and analysis presented previously [10].…”

Course Strategy: Threading Triple Bottom-Line Sustainability Across Multiple Courses

“…The care penalty is an economic concept originally described by Dr. Nancy Folbre as part of her ongoing work on the economics of care, which she defines as, "work that involves connecting to other people, trying to help people meet their needs, things like the work of caring for children, caring for the elderly, caring for sick people or teaching is a form of caring labor," [3]. As described previously, the definitions of environmental engineering published by the United States Bureau of Labor Statistics and incorporated into the Environmental Engineering Body of Knowledge are strongly related to "caring", and a prior analysis of the demographics as well as the salaries of environmental engineers support the presence of a care penalty [2].…”

“…Among the sub-disciplines of engineering, the practice of environmental engineering is somewhat unique in that evidence strongly suggests that environmental engineering is subject to the "care penalty" [2]. The care penalty is an economic concept originally described by Dr. Nancy Folbre as part of her ongoing work on the economics of care, which she defines as, "work that involves connecting to other people, trying to help people meet their needs, things like the work of caring for children, caring for the elderly, caring for sick people or teaching is a form of caring labor," [3].…”