this post was submitted on 15 Jul 2023
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[โ€“] coldv 66 points 1 year ago (3 children)

I'm not sure if this applies in general, but government sectors probably. My brother works in engineering for infrastructure and stuff, and he always brags about how much time off he gets and work life balance etc. Of course not when some environmental disaster happens, then there are lots of shit (sometimes literally) for him to deal with

[โ€“] kite 28 points 1 year ago (1 children)

That is very, very, very much not the case in general. Your brother works at a unicorn office.

[โ€“] coldv 10 points 1 year ago

Yeah could be. It could probably be also more to do with them having a union.

[โ€“] derf82 10 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I am a civil engineer in local government. Your brother is lucky. While there are some good things (pension, vacation, benefits, paid overtime), we are underpaid, have little flexibility on schedule, and are not permitted to WFH, except in d course for on our own time

[โ€“] ZeroCarbon 5 points 1 year ago

Yeah when I read the question, "construction" is definitely not one of the things that came to my mind. The work is simply too demanding, so many people involved, deadlines, work under the sun, in general I think building is hard work. I can see a structural engineer or consultant having a nice life-balance tho.

[โ€“] Lorela 6 points 1 year ago

Guess it depends on the country.

Right now, UK public sector is absolutely dire. A lot of us are wildly overworked and underpaid. I've honestly considered going back to the private sector because I could be earning about ยฃ10-15k/pa more, but at least in my specific sector I have guaranteed job security and some (largely false at this point) sense of making a positive contribution to the society I live in.

Job progression isn't easy, especially now because of cuts and recruitment freezes. There's no benefits other than always getting public holidays off. Our pensions were wrecked in 2015 and won't even compensate for it.