Abstract :
IEEE´s average U.S. member is making considerably more than he was two and three years ago. Nevertheless, as was shown in last month´s Spectrum (July, pp. 46¿49), he is not quite keeping up with inflation. This observation is supported by Fig. 1, which shows mean salaries by engineering experience for the years 1972 and 1975 as they deviate from the overall mean salaries for each year. While the overall mean has risen from $19 106 in 1972 to $23 883 in 1975 ¿ a 25-percent increase ¿ the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics has measured, through its Consumer Price Index (see July, p. 46, for a discussion of the limitations of the CPI), a 26.1-percent rise in the cost of living. As a result, it can be said that, to keep up with the CPI, the U.S. member´s mean salary should have been several hundred dollars higher than it is.
