The skills shortage, particularly for civil design and construction engineers, puts inevitable inflationary pressure on salaries as firms compete for talent. However as a professional you should not automatically expect a dramatic increase in salary when you next change jobs. The main factor influencing salaries is actually the price of water and wastewater services.
In an increasingly corporatized water sector, the amount of money that will be invested in water and wastewater is largely determined by the potential revenue streams from the investment i.e. the price of water and wastewater services. The cost of supply is one factor, as is level of demand, but they all are all trumped by political imperatives and the decisions of regulatory authorities.
South East Queensland recently faced the prospect of running out of water, and as result engaged in the construction of a massive network of pipelines and reuse plants. The cost of capacity from this scheme is in the realm of US$5000/m³/d according to the October Global Water Intelligence report, as compared to $1333/m³/d for the average global desalination scheme. The alliance contracting model and tight timelines on the scheme meant that professionals needed to be (and could be) hired whatever the cost. Consequently we saw a significant inflationary effect on salaries for design and construction engineers, making Australian salaries some of the highest in the world. I suspect it will also result in staff being laid off in the future because they will just be too expensive to be deployed on projects where cost is more important than timeliness.
The shortage of water created the political will to spend more on infrastructure, and that will be reflected in water prices down the line. That political will to spend more on infrastructure and charge more for water is only galvanized in the face of a crisis…so if you are looking to make the big dollars, don’t assume the global skills shortage will be enough to push up your salary…look for where the next crisis will be, and head there!
