Guess what!
There’s a whole generation of old men about to pass away, most of them tradesmen. And in my experience, crotchety and unwilling to teach.Because this generation generally has less interest in trades, likely from being viewed down upon (see above), there is going to be a severe shortage of people working in the trades.
This will possibly mean two things:
Companies are going to scramble desperately to get new apprentices, so -good news- more jobs. But, expect a startling lack of quality in the years to come.There’s a startling lack of quality a lot of the time now, it’s gonna get hella bad when the trades-boomers go.
True enough. I can only hear “NoBoDy WaNtS tO WoRk AnYmOrE” so many times before i figure who’s to blame for that
Exactly. Nobody wants to work for unliveable wages. It’s a wage shortage, not a labour shortage.
Or, after being tired of being lowballed for work and offers to be paid in exposure, “fuck you, pay me.”
A local (and very well off) welding company wanted me to pay for my own courses and equipment when I applied. It would have been hundreds of dollars out of my pocket, for MAYBE a chance to be taken on as an apprentice, if I withstand being the shop bítch for long enough.
PART TIME.yea,
FUCK OFF
Unreal. What do they expect you to live off?
This is so crazy to me. I got into a low voltage trade and everything was paid for. I brought minor hand tools, but everything over 100$ was provided. And that is like standard around me (for new guys). Also amazing wages once you’re a well experienced worker. (Talking 5 years or so).
Maybe not welding, or electrician, but pipefitters, plumberd, fire guys, all great trades.
What kind of work is that if I were to go looking? I really enjoyed control wiring for HVAC systems, didn’t enjoy lugging boilers up flights of stairs or brazing compressors in place in Manhattan with 1/2sqft of space to work in…
My work specifically i very company dependant, but data wire, access control, fire, cameras, all the fun “low voltage” stuff. Normally you’ll find Access, Security, and Cameras bundled. Sometimes with Fire, sometimes Data. All depends on who ya look for!
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What trade? I’ve heard of that happening to auto techs
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Things are built to spec. Everybody wants that 4500sf house but most people don’t know what quality looks like. When I was house shopping, the new construction homes homes already made me very disappointed and leary. I eventually bought an older home with a Stablok panel and felt better about that. 😂 Swapped the panel out after close, I’m not nuts.
I eventually bought an older home with a Stablok panel and felt better about that.
My house had a Bulldog panel with the original 1960s inspection sticker still attached to it. Swapped it for a modern 200 amp panel when I had my solar panels installed.
It’s hard to buy a new house in my area… They’re so expensive, and the quality just isn’t there.
Germans have a word for it. Fachkräftemangel
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They try to make it so appealing though, “Oh if you get your Red Seal, you can work anywhere I Canada.”
Great, I can be underpaid in ANY province I want.
I don’t understand why people pick on tradesman as if they’re somehow lesser than them.
There’s lots of skill and knowledge that goes along with doing any trade.
Also, while it’s back breaking work, and you often work overtime, construction workers make bank.
This is an aged and outdated take that devalues the contributions of a very important job.
All jobs are skilled labor.
Everyone shits on blue collar workers until their furnace stops working, their pipes leak, their car breaks, their roof leaks, their foundation cracks, the wiring in their house gives out… Shit, it’s almost like their work is integral to their jaded-ass day to day lives
Entitlement seems to be a fundamemtal human condition. Look at how much traditional women’s work is looked down upon. Society is simply not possible without child rearing, yet it is seen as incomparable to wage-generating work.
The fact that universal child care isnt available for parents is another disgusting insight into what the governments priorities are. Generations of people told that the true sign of success is to go to school, buy a home, have a wife and 2 kids… Then when they’re grown up, the game has changed completely.
Also, while it’s back breaking work
This is why. It’s not so much “these people are dumb” as it is “you don’t want to have to do backbreaking labor the rest of your life”.
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They get to create useful things unlike a lot of white collar jobs
That’s not fair. Do you have any idea how hard I work to put adverts into your products without making them crash? God, think next time!
Hey, c’mon those programmers making minecraft mods during their work hours are contributing to society
Maybe some people decided to play Gregtech and got inspired to get a chemistry degree, who knows
The irony is now that the situation is totally inverted.
My STEM degree has got me making a barely livable wage while the GEDs who went straight into a trade are making twice what I make.
And the cruel reality is there is not a good way to determine which way this market will go unless you’re one of the 0.01%. And if you were it would make this a mute point.
What STEM path is barely getting by? Programmers and engineers are highly sought after employees rn.
Was told this nonstop through college, took me a year to find a job paying me way less than most people’s engineering starting wage
Are you in a city with limited STEM opportunities? That has a lot to do with it. I was having an impossible time getting a programming job in my hometown, because they are a behind the times, po-dunk city. I had to move across the country to an area with a thriving tech industry to finally get my career going. It’s unfortunate, but where you live heavily impacts the job opportunities.
Nah I’m literally in Denver lmao, things are looking better now but every single entry level position must be flooded with applicants or something. So much ghosting
Nah I’m literally in Denver lmao, things are looking better now but every single entry level position must be flooded with applicants or something. So much ghosting
Well I my skill set is in programming, however to date since my graduation, I’ve only managed to get into an adjacent job which was IT.
I’m gonna try and bring my skillset up ther by focusing on network administration, since for me it would appear that my programming skill isn’t really worth that much.
IMO the hard truth is that the niche skills sell, not degrees.
Construction workers can make bank, mom!
Just have to wreck your back by the age of 35.
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Because you’re the minority. I teach these young men that their body is their most important tool and yet they take shortcuts or say, “PPE is for pussies.”
Well you just proved my point then. If these “guys” you’re talking about didn’t take shortcuts with their health and actually wore PPE etc they would be in great shape. It’s not the job it’s them.
I have a near zero probability of getting a hernia or falling from a lethal height. Plus, I have several family members who were tradesmen with destroyed backs and addicted to pain killers by their 40s. One uncle that was in a coma for 9 months from falling from a ladder and another on disability from wear and tare being a roofer.
working out regularly, eating well, and sleeping well. That’s what keep you fit and in shape. That’s it. working a manual labor job gets you the excersize part, you gotta do it properly but that task is fullfilled by having a manual labor job. You still need to eat and sleep well and not get addicted to painkillers (that can happen to anyone). An office job fulfills non of the tasks required to be fit. Sure less chance of injury since you’re in an temp controlled cubicle. Much higher chance of being unfit though.
Figuratively and literally!
Yeah mom. Wtf you on. Also…what YOU doin with your college degree mom?
I mean… At least as a construction worker my retirement plan is three-fold. The trick is to survive long enough and well enough to enjoy retirement.
The three are 401k, annuity, and the unheard of pension.
Granted, I’m also on my fourth pulled back muscle for the year. I really need to stretch more.
That’s the thought that crossed my mind. As far as pay, it is being a good stable career option - the very physical trades tend to encounter a lot more injuries and physical consequences. I respect the heck out of the trades and I work with a lot of them on different things for work - but if you look at some of the older/close to retirement folks - physical ailments and shorter life expectancy is a real concern.
Think of the “silent generation” and “baby boomers” you know that are getting up there in years. Everyone I have known that reached their 90s had fairly “cushy” desk jobs. The ones I knew who did skilled labor and trades work lived to their late 70s/early 80s.
I think, at least in the US, that we are going to REALLY feel the decrease in trades like plumbers, electricians, etc. You can teach some trades much quicker when there is a need - but with licensing and such - its going to take time to turn that ship back on course.
my parents used that one: “do you want to dig ditches when you get older ?” it took a lot of work for me to lose that attitude towards manual and mechanized labor.
Me: Yes, excavators are fun. (Note: I am not in construction though.)
Those graves aren’t digging by themselves.
Like the guy with steady pay, job security, benefits, and a strong union?
Shit I better stop studying
phone marketing would be more apt job to scare kids with. It brings nothing of value to society and its awful for the worker and those being bothered. Or just skip pointing fingers at any job and just tell the kid they will end up being exploited if they are left with no options.
They do a pretty important job, I just wish every single one of them didn’t seem to be a die-hard Trumper for some fucking reason.
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Seriously. I work with tradespeople everyday. Society would collapse in a week without them. But also most of them believe in jewish space lasers and want trump to become god king and kick out all the gays and non-whites
Then they complain NO ONE WANTS TO WORK ANYMORE when they cant find anyone who wants to work with them
While construction workers should absolutely be respected, you definitely don’t want to end up as a construction worker in India. Construction workers earn like 300-400 rupees (3.61 - 4.81 USD) per day of work in the part of India that I live in (which is a very industrious part btw). These people overwhelmingly belong to the lower castes. They don’t have their own home, and live on site in temporarily constructed structures made from metal panels.
These people suffered the most when the COVID lockdowns happened. Their places of employment fired them. They thus lost their temporary home. These people, along with their kids tried to move back to the villages that they migrated to the cities from. However, for quite some time, they weren’t allowed to return back. Thus, thousands of people were immediately made homeless, having to sleep on the streets. Of course, they were harassed by the police a lot. Finally, when special trains were organized for them, there were instances where the police sprayed water into these trains on these people “to clean them”. Watch this documentary by Vice news if you want to learn more about them.
I swear there are so many systems that should have never existed let alone be perpetuated into the current era…
“It’s ok to hate that person, they’re ARBITRARY CLASS NAME.” …ughh
Tell me your mom is totally insulated from reality and a huge cunt without saying it explicitly.
All judgement until you hear a dripping in the night and have to pay that person a quarter of your “smart peoples” wages
til I don’t make smare peoples wages.
Worked in office and construction. Prefer construction.
long term the office is likely better for your health but man actually doing things you can admire afterwards is so effing satisfying.
Long term working pretty much any straight job is bad for your health. Software design will make you crazy. Working construction for any company means getting squeezed to work too hard. Best to avoid the whole exploitative toxic mess.
Best to live in the margins.
I work as an independent general contractor in a rural area. Fix and/or build toilets, floors, walls, lights, fences etc. A little bit of everything. It’s surprisingly stable. Don’t even have to advertise. No boss. Good pay. No bennies.
My wife has tons of medical issues. That would not work for me but honestly you need a certain mindset for that I just don’t have. Most businesses actually grow out of people doing what you are now.
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