Double the number of American engineers
America awards 222,848 engineering and computer science bachelor’s degrees a year. That is 12.3 percent of all bachelor’s degrees, about the share engineering alone held in 1950.
China’s rate is 33.2 percent. At China’s rate, America would graduate 380,847 more engineers every year. Only one state, Maryland, reaches even half of China’s rate.
We propose to double that number with Digital ROTC, which funds 220,000 students a year at full scale. Digital ROTC provides student loans that cover two years of engineering, computer science or cybersecurity school at a community college, whether those years end in an associate degree or transfer into a bachelor’s program. The loans are forgiven in full after 24 to 36 months of service in government technology roles. They can come from the federal student loan program or from private lenders with a federal guarantee. Digital ROTC applies the GI Bill model to the engineering workforce.
Why America needs more engineering degrees
The superintelligence boom runs on engineers. Someone has to design the chips, build the data centers and power plants, and write the software.
The federal workforce needs new blood. Only 8 percent of federal employees are under 30, while 15 percent are over 60.
Washington overpays consultants. Contractors cost 1.83 times what federal employees cost for comparable work.
What it does
1. Brings Americans into the new SI economy. Graduates earn a degree in the field that builds superintelligence. The heartland needs it most: in Kentucky, Arkansas and Nebraska, only about 7 percent of bachelor’s degrees are in engineering and CS.
2. Makes American workers the world leaders in SI. Doubling engineering degrees raises America’s share from 12.3 percent to about 24.5 percent, close to South Korea (25.8 percent) and Germany (27.7 percent).
3. Powers up the federal government’s SI capabilities. Graduates serve inside agencies and build systems the government owns.
4. Targets $80 to $100 billion a year in savings by hiring engineers in-house. Washington spends about $793 billion a year on outside contracts, and the coalition estimates that federal IT wastes $83 billion to $145 billion a year, mostly on contractor markups and old systems. Each federal engineer who replaces a contract engineer saves about $132,000 a year.
The ask
Double the number of American engineering degrees. Build Digital ROTC.
The country has done this before. The Morrill Act, ROTC, the GI Bill and the National Defense Education Act each paid for education to make the nation stronger, and several required service in return. Read the history.