Thank you for all your comments, though I do not understand some of the implied meaning of some of the picture comments.
To be clear, I am a civil engineer. But I respectfully disagree with many of the statements that you have made. As you may know, only one counterexample is required to nullify each statement claimed to be true:
1) Your argument that civil engineers get only one chance to design things right is weak. In many cases, engineers in other areas also need to get things right the first time, for reasons of cost, environmental hazard risks, and loss of life. To further weaken your argument, many scenarios and risks today can be evaluated and assessed, with the correct application computational tools, before a structure is put into construction. Such computational tools are prevalent in the other fields because of incomplete information, high risks, high cost of exploration/testing (tests are not as cheap as you think - one car crash test could cost a million dollars, and one drill to assess location of oil reservoir costs millions of dollars and involves significant risks), or high uncertainty.
2) The issue of safety is always a top consideration for all engineering fields; to simply say that it is more critical in CE does not make CE more superior or safer than the other fields, or that the other fields do not care about safety. The fact that they are doing experiments (since it is possible anyway) only shows that they do care about safety. PE certification does not lead to safety. Safety comes only if we care about safety.
3) Your link to the balcony example provides no information whatsoever to indicate the reasons why the balcony collapsed. It could be due to lack of oversight when it comes to construction or just the fact that nobody anticipated that 13 people will be standing on the balcony. Even if you took the PE exam, you may not have anticipated that 13 people would be standing there. Were they jumping up and down or dancing on the floor? Would you design it to take 100 people? No structural component will withstand an infinite amount of load; we design components for anticipated loads plus safety factors to account for errors and uncertainty (this is already described in the codes). In other words, if you need a probability of failure of 0.00001 % for a load of X amount of load, then you design to that specification accordingly. Uncertainty quantification is required in all designs, whether in CE, ME, PE, or whatever. This need exists independent of the need for PE exam. Most likely (again, no evidence), the building was designed by a PE-certified engineer - I could turn around the argument around and say "well, the PE didn't help - the building should be safe, correct?".
4) You claim that civil/structurals deal with another entity/party. I would say that you may want to consider a more general definition of engineering - that is, we as humans, the environment, and the earth are at the receiving end from the use of engineering components and products.
The reasons you have provided are the most common (and I've heard them countless times), but I don't think they are the core reasons why the certification requirement has become so prevalent.
I agree with "dontlikebeinganeng" that civil engineers need to advocate for higher wages. While this is tangential to my initial question, it is hard to understand why civil engineers (and everyone working in the field including contractors and builders) are compensated so low when most of us are working hard and doing the long hours to do good. I hope my last statement clarifies my position about CE - that is, this field is noble, important, and has great impact on society, but we deserve to be well compensated.
With increasing competition, many companies continue to seek ways to minimize cost (low salary), and engineers (and everyone else in the field) are driven hard to deliver quickly, and are often left on their own to figure things out. I think this lack of mentorship, guidance, and motivation, are the the main reasons that contribute to many of the problems in the CE field. I don't think the lack of PE is why we are facing these issues. The other thing concerns the education of CEs - that is many of our applied coursework is based on design-by-catalogue approach and not based on first principles. Such an approach to early learning affects the way how CEs learn and approach design and engineering long after they have left school
Surely, there must be other reasons as to why there is so much focus on certification.
You say that things are pretty routine and to some extent that's true, but as a structural engineer (part of civil) a big part of my job is determining load path and getting it to the ground in safe way. Sure this sounds easy, but as you know, structures are rarely nice boxes. Now, you could make the case that other engineers have to deal with difficult things too and that this is no difference between the civil.
However, the bigger issue is that civil/structurals almost ALWAYS deal with another entity/party. A structural engineer doesn't work to make a new pump or airplane for an industrial client or to sell to other companies. We almost always deal with members of the public who are trusting us and our decisions because they have no idea how structures/civil-ish stuff works. We also do work for government entities more, and they often require licensing.
Also keep in mind that as a civil or a structural engineer, you get one shot at getting it right. A mechanical or aerospace etc can test their designs in a lab relatively easily. A structure is built, there is no real test beforehand. If a mechanical engineer's pump fails, or HVAC system malfunctions, or engine blows up, there is less of a human/property cost a great deal of the time (admittedly not always) as opposed to a structural collapse here hundreds could be injured, and the property damage and impact to the life of the general populace is greatly hindered.
When it comes to aerospace, there is a great potential for loss of human life as well, but you have pilots and maintenance crews on aircraft all day everyday to mitigate some of that risk. A structure is used everyday by pretty much everyone with limited maintenance/safeguards to prevent accidents.
This shows what I mean:
http://www.foxnews.com/us/2015/06/16/5-dead-8-injured-in-balcony-collapse-in-california-police-say/
If this were an aircraft, a pilot could say, no we're at max weight. Or the engines aren't checking out properly. A mechanical engineer could tightly control pump flow to prevent cavitation. 13 people on a balcony is probably too many and we try to design/account for that and create details so that a building can be constructed properly and easily by contractors who may be looking to cut corners.
tl;dr
So even though civil/structural is viewed as routine, it:
1.) Really isn't routine
2.) Has a high risk of life loss/damage
3.) Doesn't have tight safeguards to prevent accidents
4.) There is rarely a test/prototype design.
