About This Blog

You didn’t come here for inspiration. You came because the story you were told about mechanical engineering isn’t lining up with the week you’re living.

This blog closes that gap. It’s a running ledger of one hundred short pieces that describe the job as it is, not as it’s marketed. Plain language. Concrete stakes. A blunt opening, a few tight paragraphs, then a small, deflationary truth. No cheerleading. Oversupply sits in the background of almost every post, because it shapes everything. See Reason #1: The Field Is Oversaturated.

The focus is mechanical engineering. That’s deliberate. Some entries pull from corners of ME life that look obscure or esoteric if you haven’t worked there: supplier portals that won’t reconcile a BOM, a DV/PV queue that eats a quarter, a vibration fixture that creeps out of spec overnight. They are every bit as real as layoffs, low offers, and the missing “entry‑level” job. The same patterns show up elsewhere, but in ME the particular combination—oversupply, broad‑but‑vague training, custodial work near the plant, and thin leverage—makes the problems bite harder. See Reason #2: The Four-Year Degree That Takes Five (or Six) and Reason #14: You’ll Be the Custodian, Not the Creator.

Each Reason stands alone, but they talk to each other early and often. You’ll see cross‑links inside the posts in the form “See Reason #X.” Follow them and the pattern gets harder to ignore. Start with how colleagues become competitors in a tight market (See Reason #6: Your Colleagues Are Your Competitors) and why there’s no guild to stand between you and the headwinds (See Reason #13: No Guild, No Protection). Then go back to the four‑year degree that slips to five or six and ask who benefits. See Reason #2: The Four-Year Degree That Takes Five (or Six).

Who is this for? Students who haven’t signed the loan papers. Grads who keep hearing “get more experience” for roles that require experience. Working MEs who spend more time in PowerPoint and status meetings than in design and wonder why the technician owns the hands‑on work while management owns the decisions. See Reason #9: You Will Spend More Time in PowerPoint Than in Design.

If you go into ME anyway, fine. At least you’ll be choosing with your eyes open. If you’re already in it, you’ll have words for why it feels the way it does.

While Mechanical Engineering is sold as a foundation, it is more often a weight.