Re: Crappy Pay - WHY???

It seems to me that the crappy pay boils down to a combination of poor
organization and over supply of professionals in a highly volatile market.
Architecture and the other built-environment design professions are percieved
as glamourous and are very popular with ever increasing groups of students
entering (and exiting) college. On the other hand, automation has had a great
impact on the profession making it possible for one professional to do what
required a professional, two apprentices, a secretery and a book keeper to do
ten years ago. Add to that a precipitous drop in demand for new buildings and
developments over the same time period.

A few years ago there was some publicity that the supply of dentists exceeded
the demand and that income for new dentists was plummeting.  About that time
dental schools began to close at various universita.  One school which closed
was the dental school at Emory University here in Atlanta.

I really do not understand why design professionals cannot effectively
organize to control their own professional destiny. However, I suspect that
the infamous architect's ego will never allow us to admit a need to control
the supply of professional services; we tend to think that our professions
were created by God as the answer to the problems of humanity. Perhaps the
dentists are somewhat more rational.