letters Where are t h e Jobs?
DEAR Sm: The articles, “New skills for out-ofwork engineers” and “Jobs in the environmental field,” (ES&T, April and August, 1972, respectively) have been of particular interest to our organization, the Association of Technical Professionals. The ATP, consisting of employed, underemployed, and unemployed technical professionals, was formed in 1971 in the Boston area in response to the critical and continuing unemployment problem among our colleagues. Our scope includes both immediate assistance to the unemployed and a critical study of long-range national policies and priorities that affect the productive utilization of technically trained manpower. Professor Daniel Okun (Letter to the editor, ES&T, June 1972) has expressed a point of view that has hindered many well-qualified former aerospace technical professionals in obtaining employment-that they (a) are less competent than the employed, and (b) cannot possibly cope with new applications of their skills unless properly certified by an accredited academic institution. This narrow, self-serving viewpoint was eloquently rebutted by Lawrence Slote (EST, August 1972). It is our observation that universities have
without chromates, phosphates or other pollutants An algae population explosion can play havoc with heat transfer efficiency. Keep the bugs down, the efficiency up, with Oakite Biocide 20, specially formulated to inhibit growth of algae, bacteria and fungi within recirculating water systems. A readily disposable water treatment, Oakite Biocide 20 is most effective used as a periodic shock treatment, 5 to 50 ppm. It works over a broad pH range, is non-foaming, non-corrosive and stable for long periods, even at elevated temperatures.
I f scale and corrosion are also a problem, Oakite ENPROX 555 offers a simple solution. It inhibits formation of calcium, magnesium and barium scale and, in some instances, gradually removes existing deposits. Simultaneously, a monomolecular film inhibits corrosion. Oakite Biocide 20 and ENPROX 555 make the perfect team for keeping the troublemakers out of water cooling systems. Effective, economical and flexible, both are also readily disposable. Write for literature. OAKITE PRODUCTS, INC., 50 VALLEY ROAD, BERKELEY HEIGHTS, N. J. 07922 in Canada: OAKITE PRODUCTS OF CANADA LTD., ONTARIO Subsidiaries and Distributors World-wide Cable: OAKITE BerkeleyHeights Circle No. 12 on Readers’ Service Card 958 Environmental Science & Technology
Letters to ES&T We welcome letters from readers on any subject of environmental importance including, of course, matters which have been the subject of articles i n ES&T. Letters should be brief a n d t o the point-300 words maximum is a usef u l goal. Potential interest t o other readers is the main criterion used i n deciding whether or not t o publish a letter. We will consequently not publish letters t h a t are merely abusive or merely laudatory! Letters t h a t promise t o add t o our readers’ knowledge or understanding of environmental problems will be given primary consideration. Comments on papers published i n the Current Research section will be considered as Correspondence. This type of comment, if published, will appear i n Current Research, and not i n this Letters column. The authors of t h e original paperwill ordinarily be allowed t o reply-see ES&T’s editorial policy on page 523 of the June 1972 issue.
The Editors
been the principal beneficiaries of federally funded retraining programs, which have cost millions to train a few, only a fraction of whom have found jobs at the completion of their courses. Thus far, the opportunity for retraining has been offered to about 1 or 2 x of the unemployed technical professionals. Professor Okun’s protestations about the quality of retraining are probably irrelevant. The plain fact of the matter is that the jobs simply are not there. We have heard inflated projections of demands for technical professionals in environmental sciences and other fields for the past several years, but they have failed to materialize in any significant way. We will not be able to absorb productively our technical manpower resources until there is a change in national priorities to create a market for their services. As an overworked but appropriate analogy, we “put a man on the moon” by virtue of a firm national commitment in both will and dollars. There was then a market for technical talent. No one inquired whether a PhD chemist had been retrained in space sciences. The technical professionals working on those programs created space sciences. No such national commitment to environmental quality in an expanding economy is in prospect. In fact, the real EPA budget for fiscal 1973 has been reduced from that in 1972. Until we are willing to devote the same resources to the quality of life as we have to space and defense, all the retraining programs for nonexistent jobs will be merely window dressing for political rhetoric.
S . P. Jones Association of Technical Professionals Cambridge, Mass. 02142
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DEAR SIR: The article on SOz removal technology that appeared on page 688 of the August 1972 issue, in general summarized the current situation quite well. However, in the table on page 689, and in the text on page 691: you refer incorrectly to the Chemic0 MgO process. It is actually the Chemico-Basic MgO process, the result of a joint development effort by Chemical Construction Corp. and Basic Chemicals, a Division of Basic Inc. The process technology is held by the jointly owned company, Chemico-Basic, Inc. J. E. Radway Basic Chemicals CleGeland, Ohio 44 I I5
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Volume 6, Number 12, November 1972 959
