Sometimes it feels like 90% of our readers are military officers, engineers or lawyers. Write anything which directly deals with their expertise and you’d better stand back from the email in-box. Anyway, here’s one:

Your father’s explanation is correct. All the engineers in industry that I know viewed engineering as a way to live a dream. The dream was to have a fun, creative job (ie I get to brag that I invent computer chips) and get paid well for it.
But if all we cared about was big money, we would leave engineering and move into marketing/sales/management which makes lots more money.
I also teach part-time. Why? Because I really do love to teach. I love seeing a student with gang tatoos pondering a calculus problem so he can “move on up”. (This example really happened to me). When I retire, I will continue teaching. But if I did it full-time, my pay would be about a third of what I make now and I would enjoy teaching less. I would also do less creative work since teaching leaves little time to make anything really new. I got into engineering to make things, not to talk about it.
I can also tell you that the engineering students prefer the part-time instructors. The students are busting their butts because they want a job and the part-timers are more likely to tell them what they actually need to work in industry.
Now if only I could meet some girls. Sigh.