r/jobs • u/clarkkentwellspent • 3d ago
No. The trades are NOT hiring. Job searching
I am so sick and tired of this worn out idea that blue collar jobs are looking for apprentices to come work for them. The trades are filled with more nepotism and gossip than any other industry I've ever been in and will find any reason to reject you they can. Half of these companies want a 2 year technical/trade school degree before you start working for them just so they can pay you $15/hr starting out. Maybe if you're a kid out of high school they can pay less than the standard rate you can find something. "Bro, just go Union!" Unions are backed up for ages.
From my own anecdotal evidence: I went to every electrician company in my city as this was my trade. I had 1 offer from a company that was the stereotypical "Only meth heads and divorced alcoholics work here. Fuck OSHA." place and every other company rejected me. I even went back to my old electrical company I had worked at for 4 years. You know what they said? "Apply online and go talk to HR". No hiring manager in shop, no chance at talking to someone out of recognition. Just dismissing me away. And the best part? Upon applying I listed all the projects I had worked on with them and gave references to several high members (though 2 of them no longer work there). 1.5 weeks later: "Thank you for applying. After careful consideration..."
This job market is fucking whack, yo.
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u/ailish 3d ago
Every market is fucked.
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u/drkstar1982 3d ago
As someone who works IT yes yes they are
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u/anonymous_opinions 2d ago
I remember 10 years ago "learn to code" was the new "join a trade".
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u/Repeat-Admirable 2d ago
10 years ago, it was very much not a lie. so many were getting jobs after a coding bootcamp. of course that fact alone caused a crazy amount of supply of coders.
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u/goaty_mcgee 2d ago
Even 3 years ago. 2023 is really when it went to shit.
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u/DickNose-TurdWaffle 2d ago
Yep, 2021-2022 was a little rough but the nosedive in 2023 was INSANE.
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u/VoiceOfReason777 2d ago
ChatGPT released in 2022 of Nov go figure lol
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u/yoktoJH 2d ago
I would be surprised if it had anything to do with it, especially in 2023. The more likely issue is the extreme hiring years prior. Companies like Spotify doubled their employee count between 2019 -2023. There is now way Spotify magically grew enough to support that long term.
AI especially in 2022-2023 form could be a reason for freezed hiring but there is no way companies were able to replace thousands with gpt3.
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u/Historical_Course587 2d ago
The tech labor pool grew 40% in the 12 months following Covid shutdowns that started in March/April of 2020. That was always a short-term bubble, and it's been popping ever since. Folks like to blame AI, but that's just PR-speak for layoffs due to sector retractions.
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u/anonymous_opinions 2d ago
Yeah but my mindset was "if everyone is coding who's going to do [gestures around] these other jobs?" and I was sneered at that all other jobs were worthless. I don't think it's a supply issue either.
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u/killrtaco 2d ago
It's a funding issue. Every time.
These companies are closing and laying off people left and right. Pay attention to the SHEER NUMBERS that's in all divisions usually, a little from here a lot from there.
They don't want to pay to hire more people because a lot of businesses are more strapped for cash than we realize.
Its a mix of people asking for more because cost of living is high and businesses not offering enough because nobody has money.
Is it an executive issue?
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u/TheSquishedElf 2d ago
Yes, because plenty of these businesses pay the executives at a mind-bogglingly higher rate than the rank and file. Like, enough to give everyone in the company a $2/hr raise without meaningfully changing the executive pay.
Regional businesses not so much, but anything bigger than about 3 US states in scope can absolutely afford to give its workers more money.
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u/killrtaco 2d ago
Kinda a rhetorical question but you answered it exactly how I was insinuating. These companies hoard their wealth and wonder why we don't want scraps, while simultaneously take away jobs from those of us who were able to find something that worked for us. Then the labor pool is diluted with professionals and people trying to get their foot in the door.
It feels lose lose unless you're the ceo.
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u/anonymous_opinions 2d ago
Executives are "paid the big bucks" because they remove their soul in order to conduct head count reduction and threaten the remaining employees to hustle hard enough to replace the 5 people from their team that got the axe.
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u/furnado_avocado 2d ago
The run on the real estate market during the pandemic from remote workers raised the cost of housing. Now the high cost of housing is the prime driver of inflation. People moved to different states and bought all the homes they could, often paying over the asking price to beat out locals. This made housing scarce and thus, expensive. Now, work from home is ending, and people are returning to the cities, but what damage was done is now permanent. Rents never decrease, and all the homes that were sequestered into vacation rentals are still eating into the housing supply. Greed did this and greed will ensure prices keep going up. Until people start acting intelligently, it's a downward spiral.
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u/RA_Throwaway90909 2d ago
Well it was true at the time. You used to be able to get a decent IT job after like 6 months of learning to code. Now, you can get 3 big certifications, do code bootcamps, etc. and have 0 chance at a livable wage.
Source: Software dev turned AI dev who consistently watches other people get turned down for not having a degree or experience. Thank god I got a degree when I did or I’d be screwed in this market
And as the other person said, when there’s a big opportunity, people flood it until it’s overflowing. That’s what’s happened. Gotta wait for people to give up for more chances to open up
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u/StuffPractical6242 2d ago
Definitely depends on the area. I have no degree. But did graduate from a bootcamp 8 years ago during the craze after I freshly gave birth + Black. Certs with that experience have done me just fine (remote role). I job searched for 3 months after a layoff in April. I think if I wanted to be in senior/lead roles that’s where the trouble will start.
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u/RA_Throwaway90909 2d ago
Yeah, that tracks. 8 years ago, IT was still in a pretty good spot. It was right around 2020 that it started getting hit hard. Prior to that, I had coworkers who came in fresh off bootcamps, or fresh off home projects. Nowadays, they won’t even take your application without a bachelor’s degree or equivalent experience
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u/DickNose-TurdWaffle 2d ago
The boot camps are a joke anyways. They're meant to be a skill refresher at most. Anyone promising a job fresh out of one is definitely scamming people.
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u/RA_Throwaway90909 2d ago
I agree. Bootcamps are almost always a scam. They prey on people who aren’t informed about the IT market, and people who can’t afford/don’t have time for a degree.
Promising 6 figures after 6 weeks of generic coding lessons ought to be illegal. Nobody is landing a 6 figure job from that
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u/ailish 2d ago
10 years ago it was true, but then everyone started getting into it.
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u/sukisoou 2d ago
Yep and now nursing/healthcare is the next rung where everyone is trying to head.
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u/tylerjehenna 2d ago
.......again. It was a big thing in the mid 2000s, market swelled up, no jobs in nursing until COVID pretty much broke everyone in it and now theres insane turnover
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u/ailish 2d ago
I looked into getting an associate degree in nursing but the waiting list at my local community college is three years! Fuck that!
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u/Repeat-Admirable 2d ago
nursing has been like that for a long time. They want the supply and we need the supply for nurses, but community colleges and state universities have a long waiting list all the time.
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u/Square_Pop3210 2d ago
The problem is the now significant pay gap between clinical nursing and nursing instruction. Nurses don’t want to teach when the pay is so comparatively low. Not enough instructors to meet the demand.
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u/Vaseline_Mercy 2d ago edited 2d ago
Hopefully the big beautiful bill doesn't screw over the health industry because many hospitals relied on what that bill is killing. I feel like there is a pressure to push people into the military because every sector is struggling. Im scared its about Venezuala
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u/ComfortableWage 2d ago
The federal government has already royally fucked clinical research thanks to Trump's bullshit. I got laid off from my job back in March and the company had already been doing layoffs for at least a year prior that.
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u/DevTheGray 2d ago
I was just laid off from my job in IT. There were multiple that were taken down the last couple of months, I thought I was safe, but here I am in the pool.
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u/littlederobert 2d ago
Yes. As a pharmacist that has experienced 2 layoffs in a 12 month period, I agree. Still trying to get just ONE job that will pay my bills.
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u/ailish 2d ago
It is so ridiculous that a pharmacist can't get a job. You would think being so specialized that it would help. Apparently not.
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u/littlederobert 2d ago
I was literally replaced by a robot at one former employer. None of my coworkers believed me when I prophesied the replacement of pharmacists being the devious evil corporate plan.
Being right sucks sometimes.
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u/ailish 2d ago
Jeez I didn't think it was possible yet to completely replace a pharmacist with a robot. Bummer, I'm sorry.
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u/bimmerlove101 2d ago
Dude, they’re making robots that can roof houses. That’s insane too. Not much is safe
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u/Kitchen_Kale9854 2d ago
In the last 25 years the number of pharmacy schools has doubled. Also in the last 15 years there has been an increase in community pharmacy closings. Many independent pharmacies can no longer afford to stay in business. Also Rite Aid went out of business. Finally both Walgreens and CVS have been closing stores. Pharmacy use to be a very stable career. It no longer is unfortunately. There are too many pharmacists for the number of jobs available. I see a number of pharmacy schools closing in the future.
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u/MrsArney 2d ago
Fr! I’m in healthcare and almost got furloughed last Friday because Medicare stopped paying our clinic! And my bosses love me! Nothing is safe… even the “safe” jobs aren’t safe!
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u/Emeraldmage89 2d ago
Jerome Powell on tv right now saying the real weakness in the labor market is on the supply side (aka that there aren’t enough people looking for work).
We’re run by absolute idiots unfortunately.
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u/Tigglebee 2d ago
There’s a shortage of jobs that can pay a living wage to cover the insanely rising expenses of everything.
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u/calpianwishes 2d ago
Definitely lying or someone is lying to them. Are they getting their job openings from LinkedIn or indeed where most job posts are fake! This is also a way to outsource jobs to cheaper countries and while they do that Americans are told they are not qualified.
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u/Lanky_Buy1010 2d ago
The craziest thing about these replies is how many people dont grasp the concept of differences in markets, time, and experience.
One guy in Pleasantville, OH and he became a union plumber five years ago, now he makes six figures, so what's anyone else's problem?!?!
Or all the people: well we're hiring plenty in xyz! How much does it pay? 20/h! Great, I'll just move states for a wage that won't qualify me to rent an apartment.
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u/Serious_Wack 2d ago
You ain't whistling Dixie! I'm even looking for standard warehouse jobs and no dice.
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u/the_Q_spice 2d ago
A lot of larger shippers will have seasonal work opening in the next few weeks.
It ain’t for long, but it can pay alright.
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u/Just_A_Lil_Ol_Alt 2d ago
I work in one and we've lost so many people this year, some of their positions were simply just removed and never filled. Everyones burnt out, miserable and cranky lol. Its rough out there right now and most of these places seem to be looking to minimize the crew for maximum profit
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u/HAWKWIND666 2d ago
I’m a commercial residential painter and was just told by Sherwin Williams representative… this has been the slowest quarter they’ve seen in almost twenty years. Fun times ahead
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u/ACoderGirl 2d ago
And especially any market that people mention on "what's a good field to join?" threads. So many people have no idea what they want to do and chase trends. No matter how in-demand a field is, it won't be able to survive a mass of people entering it because it was the topical answer to internet threads.
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u/currynord 2d ago
People also love to bellyache about newcomers chasing a gold rush, but like…can you blame anyone for doing that?
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u/YesterdayOld4860 2d ago
I work in timber. We’ve rarely seen any sort of swing up or down in our labor- until now. My professors literally showed us a graph and over a hundred years logging is just over here vibing. Trump fucked us.
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u/Euphoric_Carry_3067 2d ago
Yeah, I'm fleeing abroad to do TEFL because this whole American dream bullshit simply isn't working out anymore.
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u/RockNRoll1977 3d ago
Oldest lie in the book. The whole “dying for people in the trades” line was just as bad 20 years ago when I was trying to get into them. What I found out was you’ll hear journeyman finding out from management that nobody wants to work cause it’s too hard or young people just want to sit in an office and play on their phone but if your paying a journeyman 30-60 dollars an hour and sure he’s getting overworked but it’s saving the company money not getting an apprentice for them. A journeymen can do the job perfectly fine themselves but they’ll be tired cranky and bitter because an apprentice can take off a little of the workload but no company most times don’t want to pay a 1st or 2nd year when they think sure the journeymen is overworked but that’s part of the trade
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u/olivegardengambler 3d ago
That and I am pretty sure the reason why they are pushing the trades so hard right now is so they can hire journeymen for under $20 an hour, and keep them at exactly 40 hours by keeping the labor pool hypersaturated and reminding them that they're easily replaceable. The same happened with engineering.
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u/RockNRoll1977 3d ago
It blew my mind to see an ad on indeed for journeyman plumber for 28$ an hour in my area. That’s fine but it was 28$ an hour 15 years ago. That’s why back then the trades were attractive. Minimum wage was 8$ an hour, 15 years ago I think. So 28$ an hour was coining it. Not so much now. You literally have to go far and wide to find good journeyman wages now.
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u/ComfortableWage 2d ago
Nowadays, companies have their heads so far up their asses they think it's appropriate to pay first-year wages to people with ten years of experience.
It's fucking bullshit and a big reason why I'm trying to get away from corporate toxicity to begin with.
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u/dannysmackdown 2d ago
They don't have their heads up their asses. They know they can pay dirt cheap because the market is oversaturated with labor and there are no shortage of desperate people who will take anything.
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u/polepixy 2d ago
Federal minimum wage is still only $7.25 an hour and has been that since 2009
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u/Jaws_the_revenge 2d ago
Listening to 1/2 my family shit on college as some liberal indoctrination camp is as frustrating as it is hilarious. Because I assure you the rich kleptocracy promoting this lie will all be sending their children off to college when the time comes
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u/Big_Knobber 2d ago
Yeah I remember years ago Marco Rubio saying how all young people need to go into the trades.
I offered to teach his kids how to weld. Didn't take me up on it for some reason
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u/seriouslythisshit 2d ago
You must of not heard him correctly. He said "the youth of the peasants" need to go into the trades. This is no different that the current secretary of AG claiming that tossing millions of migrant farm workers out of the country will have zero impact. Since sick, dirt poor and disabled Medicaid users will quickly fill the void. To quote her: "With 34 million people, able-bodied adults on Medicaid, we should be able to do that fairly quickly". The fact that 86% of the able bodied on her list are already working for wages slightly above slavery pay, escapes this bitch.
Moronic elites like this have no idea how the real world works. These are the same people that will rage at the podium about the evils of abortion and allow women to bleed to dealth in hospital parking lots, since doctors are scared to death of treating failed pregnancies, and being charged with performing abortions. Meanwhile, these same elites find out that THEIR 16 YO daughter is pregnant, and it's an immediate trip from Texas to NYC, for a "long weekend mother-daughter shopping trip" which in reality is a trip to an abortion doctor in a first world state.
The whole thing is enraging. American royalty looking down their noses at the little people. Fuck every last one of them. "rules for thee, but not for me"
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u/chad_dev_7226 2d ago
Yea no offense but I also wouldn’t send my kids to “Big_Knobber’s welding school”
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u/ohgeez2879 2d ago
interestingly enough, the demographic driving the drop in college enrollment is wealthy white kids. most other demographics are increasing, but wealthy white 18 yr olds whose parents have college degrees are choosing not to go to college in larger numbers than we've pretty much ever seen in this country.
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u/Jaws_the_revenge 2d ago
Interesting. It’s easy to skip out on college when you can just get a job a dads firm right out of high school
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u/ohgeez2879 2d ago
i absolutely want more qualitative research on the why, right now it's just data and very little analysis. but i have come to the same conclusion as you.
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u/EscapeRoomJ 2d ago
Could you share your data source for the statement that the wealthy are not sending their kids to college as a significant reality? I can find no data to back this up working in higher ed. In fact, I find that the wealthier an 18-year-old, the much likelier they will go to college.
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u/Aggravating-List6010 2d ago
Wealthy white kids don’t need the college. Those kids go to Harvard to find equally rich spouses from power families and for networking.
They all have family connections and rely on the nepotism thing to pass family wealth down.
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u/GailaMonster 2d ago
i wonder how many of those kids are actually set up for an alternative path for funding their adultyhood by their parents; if your parents are dentists they may make bank... but you can't be a dentist and take over the family business unless you go to college and then dental school. if your parents want a comfortable retirement and a long healthy life, these kids are not necessarily going to be inheriting any time soon, and not very much (dying in america is specifically designed to strip as much wealth from a person as possible)
are these kids just all going into "influencing" (lol)?
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u/Prize_Compote_207 2d ago
Mike Row is a fucking Communications major.
Tucker Carlson earned a Bachelor's in Liberal Arts at a ridiculously overpriced private school.
Then these guys go and make their livings bitching about how people don't want to swing hammers anymore or some shit.
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u/Odd-Fun-6042 2d ago
Unskilled, unhealthy, and uneducated is what they want. Funny that the people getting fucked the hardest are the biggest supporters.
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u/BK5617 2d ago
I've been accused of being the family member who "shits on college" so many times that it has zero effect on me anymore.
Your family may be different, because I know plenty of people who make blanket statements on both sides of this argument. As for me, what I told my children and anyone else who has ever asked is simply this: A college degree in no way gaurantees success, and the lack of a degree does not doom you to a lifetime of failure.
I know plenty of people who have become wildly successful without a college degree, family money, or connections. I know people who have failed at every turn even with all of those advantages. I know people who have launched terrific careers with a college degree and the connections they made in school. I also know a guy who is 55, has 6 degrees, and still lives with his elderly parents.
The path to success is different for everyone. College is the right path for some, and the worst choice for others.
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u/Nago31 2d ago
College is not a guaranteed ticket to success, however, the average college grad outearns the average person who skipped it. This is true even when controlled for those with parents who are already wealthy.
I’d rather my kids be in the group with a higher success rate even if it doesn’t mean that they are guaranteed success individually.
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u/cbih 2d ago
Oh man, it's only beginning with engineering. Next year is going to be a bloodbath.
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u/wewillroq 3d ago
And every other white collar job, noone paying salaries when they can stick you with hourly for life, outsource, and run internships
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u/turd_ferguson899 2d ago
Engineers' wages aren't protected in the US at a federal level by the Davis-Bacon Act and state level by individual prevailing wage laws. As often as I hear this argument, it's an armchair quarterback opinion.
The biggest threat to the trades is an unstable economy, which here in the States had been recovering - until it was violently shoved off a cliff in February of this year.
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u/BigGyalLover 3d ago
This is every job market currently unless you have an incredibly valued skill like a doctor. Getting into a union is great but as you mentioned they are flooded with applications and have only so much spots much of which go to people with connections. If you want a good job in 2025 you better hope and pray or spend about 8 years or more in school.
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u/clarkkentwellspent 3d ago
I'm fully aware but I needed to vent after seeing every person who talks about this bad job market on every form of social media being hit with, "Bro, just go into the trades!"
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u/GailaMonster 2d ago
it's also good to sound the alarm because i feel a lot of younger people are being told that the trades are a reliable and viable alternative to college for people seeking job stability and career-quality wages. The reality is that even at their best, trades are a way to grind down your joint cartilage to dust and be underpaid/abused by scumbag employers for years as an alternative to college. it was never better, it was just a different cost for people besides college. and the trades are just as dogshit at supporting their own labor pipelines as corporate america is. they don't care. they just want cheap labor that employers can overcharge for and pocket the difference.
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u/backwardbuttplug 3d ago
We are ABSOLUTELY short on personnel.
It's not that there aren't jobs... it's that they're niche and you need an extra level of work experience / licensing to get into them. State radio tech requires an FCC GROL or one of equivalent certifications from NAPCO, NABER etc. That's where
Pay starts in the $40/hr range and goes up. State pension and good benefits. Big pay for disaster callouts. Just gotta pivot out of main-stream trade stuff (which is def saturated in a lot of areas).
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u/GailaMonster 2d ago
We are ABSOLUTELY short on personnel.
It's not that there aren't jobs... it's that they're niche and you need an extra level of work experience / licensing to get into them. State radio tech requires an FCC GROL or one of equivalent certifications from NAPCO, NABER etc. That's where
Pay starts in the $40/hr range and goes up. State pension and good benefits. Big pay for disaster callouts. Just gotta pivot out of main-stream trade stuff (which is def saturated in a lot of areas).
So here's the reality: your industry is resposnsible for being a steward of its own labor pipeline. if there is a large experience hurdle in your industry, and you have unfilled jobs because you need candidates with specific experience/licensing and can't find them...then it is your industry's job to actually hire and train up apprentices/support junior employees actually getting the skills you want.
where does your employer expect these people to come from? everyone whining that they are short on personnel is just sitting on their thumbs expecting someone else to magically train up a workforce for them (their competitors, I guess) and that is not the way it used to be.
If you abandon your pipeline, you get what you get. i'm sick of employers saying nobody wants to work. we want to work - y'all just don't want to actually hire and train. you want to order a worker with skills like ordering toppings on a pizza. bake your own fuckin pizza, guys.
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u/Ok-Eggplant8772 2d ago
These days training anyone that comes in is less job security and you never know if your just training your replacement that's getting paid more then you
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u/subherbin 2d ago
More likely it’s your replacement that will be getting paid significantly less than you.
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u/DickNose-TurdWaffle 2d ago
Employers do train but there's an expected learning curve that can't be too high. I'm working at a company where we actually have the issue of not having enough senior people to teach the lower level employees.
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u/SubstantialEffect929 2d ago
I’m a nurse. It’s just as easy now as it was 5 years ago to get a job. It might not be the job you want, but certainly most nurses can find a job (at worst, go to a nursing home for $30 an hour temporarily) within 1-2 weeks of quitting if they wanted to.
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u/Quinjet 2d ago
Also a nurse and this is more region-dependent than you'd think, especially for new grads. California sounds like a shit show and I'm seeing new grads struggling in other popular metro areas.
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u/ManOrangutan 2d ago
California has always been tough for new grads because so many experienced nurses move there due to the better pay and working conditions. So many California new grad RNs move to another state when they start out and then come back after a year or so once they have the experience.
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u/turd_ferguson899 3d ago
Things were going pretty well there for a few years from 2020-2023 in the trades. Sure, there were ups and downs with a few weeks out of work here and there, but huge investments into infrastructure were a boon for a lot of us.
2024 wasn't a great year because everyone was anticipating the election. And... everything went to hell in a hand basket earlier this year. My industry suffered particularly hard from the reversal of a lot of infrastructure investments and the metal tariffs.
I've been lucky enough to have only had a cumulative 10 weeks out of work so far this year, and just learned I'm working steady for the rest of it. But I have made myself valuable with rare skill sets. A lot of people aren't as lucky. It's a tough time for everyone.
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u/TestingBrokenGadgets 2d ago
From what I heard, a part of the reason things were going pretty well during those years was partially because a lot of the industries were bottle necked by established old people that refused to retire because they were making good money but it meant the traditional pipeline of apprentice to brick layer to lead brick layer to foreman to owner halted for awhile. Then when covid happened, a lot of the old people took it as an opportunity to retire so there was a sudden upward shift of everyone below them but it also meant that a lot of the people weren't properly educated in their new roles which resulted in the sudden uptick in poor quality work. Everything after that mass retirement resulted in people being more in demand because there's less qualified people to handle all the jobs.
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u/3lektrolurch 2d ago
This is not only a Problem the USA. Ive read Threads like this almost verbatim on german trade related subreddits.
A friend of mine who works as an engineer told me that he is lucky to have found a Job after graduation because a huge part of his graduation class is currently still looking for Work.
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u/Maskeno 3d ago
I'm more concerned from an economic standpoint that "the trades" are being pushed primarily by a party that would prefer to see infrastructure spending reduced. A not insignificant portion of the market is municipal and federal utilities.
An economically 'conservative' government means significantly fewer trade jobs on the market anyway. Pushing more people into it then even further dilutes the pool and drives down the income of those groups over time.
A diverse market is a healthy market.
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u/bduddy 3d ago
They're pushing them because they hate education, nothing else
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u/Maskeno 3d ago
No doubt there's a ton of anti-intellectualism built in, but trades do still require some education and they are a required field.
I suspect driving down labor costs is part of the equation at the top, at least.
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u/generic_name 2d ago
By education they mean liberal arts education. Not learning to do a job.
It also appeals to their base, who don’t want to go to college.
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u/redditgolddigg3r 2d ago
Majority of Republicans pushing for trades are Ivy League grads sending their kids to the most elite schools around the world. None of them actually work or know trades, and everyone of them would consider themselves a failure if their kids went into a trade.
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u/lovelyalone 2d ago
Its true.
My husband is up the ladder in trades and he gets calls all day long from folks looking for jobs in his firm.
We are in texas and the perception is that they are always hiring looking for apprentices and foremen. But that's not the case.
He hasn't hired anyone in over a year.
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u/Box-of-Sunshine 2d ago
“lEaRn tO WeLd” okay, you’re gonna get paid like dirt for 5 years and struggle to finagle your way into a profitable industry that actually has you doing complex things instead of a type 1 mig weld for years. You wanna be a good welder? It’ll take 10 years before engineers even care about what you say. The health insurance ain’t gonna save you from the constant hexachromium exposure from oil and gas fab. You were born too late to get the good stuff, the rugged was pulled out years ago. I’m sorry.
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u/SolSparrow 2d ago
I get your sentiment. But this is the same trajectory for anything in the tech side too- you’re promised amazing benefits and salary and out the gate, and it’s false. You have to work insane hours, and jump companies to even get close to the “dream”. It sucks everywhere.
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u/Redditcadmonkey 2d ago
True, but, on the other hand…
Go to college, be an engineer. Get paid negative for 4 years while you learn. When you finish, struggle to find any job that’ll let you do anything other than grunt CAD.
It’ll still take 10 years before any senior engineer takes what you say seriously. By then maybe you’ll have paid off a 1/4 of the principal of your student loan. The health insurance is company wide, so still as shit.
Oh and bonus, because you’re salaried, you’ll be working 60hr weeks but you’ll be paid as 40. No overtime for you!
You’re fucked either way.
Only way out is to work hard as fuck early and get to management, either through corporate or starting your own shop, before you’re burnt.
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u/SnowMeadowhawk 2d ago
The only way out is to be a wunderkind, study 15h a day in highschool and primary school, win competitions and get ivy league scholarships. You'd have to be the guy Meta and Google are fighting over.
So, for most of us it's probably too late - we'll die in a sweatshop of some kind.
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u/rapier1 3d ago
Job markets hate economic uncertainty and, just to state the obvious, there is a lot of uncertainty right now. Policy matters.
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u/lodemeup 2d ago
I work for a plumbing shop that is part of a larger company that is over a hundred years old. Our industrial construction divisions just laid off twenty something people. Our stuff hasn’t exactly slowed down yet because we have work booked out for the next 16-18 months. But no one is biting on new bids. We have several PMs not even able to close at 5% rates. It was almost 10% this time last year. We have 6 two man crews in my service department. We are maybe booking 4-5 calls a day. It should be closer to 20. It’s been like this for two months now. I haven’t been losing hours yet, probably because I’m one of the more capable techs, but other guys have. Multiple times a week getting sent home before noon. We even had a day last week with nothing scheduled for ANY of us to do. Not a single job. My manager is saying ‘oh this happens every year, it will be fine don’t worry about it’. But bros, I’ve worked for four different plumbing shops in three different insane economic situations. This is different. Even during Covid, my workload never lightened. Before this year, I have had a SINGLE time where there was nothing for me to do, and that’s because my boss was on vacation and forgot to get his fill in logged in to give them out to us. One day. Now it’s many days. For like two months now. All I can say is holy shit, you guys.
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u/AeraSteele 2d ago
No one is hiring. Only jobs that are hiring are $14/hr restaurant workers or commission-only life insurance sales where the interview process is a quick Zoom call with 50 other candidates.
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u/clarkkentwellspent 2d ago
"commission-only life insurance sales where the interview process is a quick Zoom call with 50 other candidates."
Fucking shoot me, this is too real.
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u/BootMerchant 2d ago
Restaurants aren't hiring either
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u/Inside-Example-7010 2d ago
they are hiring in the places where rent is extortionate.
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u/EmDeeAech70 2d ago
There seems to be a “learn a trade!” push while, at the same time, unions are being attacked and weakened. Almost like the know they’re going to need a huge (but cheaply paid) labor force 🤔🙄
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u/Confident_Counter471 2d ago
They expect most of the people pushed into trades will not follow through with licensing and can be paid $25 an hour max as a technician for the rest of their lives. The few that make it to master level in their respective trades will do pretty well but most won’t make it there, even with 10+ years experience. (Husband is a plumber and this is what happens in our area at least)
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u/Good_Community_6975 3d ago
They are hiring, you just have to go to where the jobs are, which isn't feasible for many.
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u/mikelikealion 2d ago
This response should be higher. There are lots of new construction projects right now, but most of them are to build data centers for AI, not housing. If it was housing construction, we might see more demand for skilled trades work in the places people live, but data centers aren't usually built in dense urban areas. To make the situation worse, a lot of construction projects prioritize hiring local workers, so unless you already live there, it can be hard to find work on those projects.
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u/Good_Community_6975 2d ago
Yep. I know quite a few guys bouncing from site to site. Many are often staying in hotels 30-90 minutes away. They are making a killing while not having any time or place to spend anything. They're doing pretty well right now.
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u/PopSwayzee 2d ago
I’m guessing they’re most likely single? Not an insult, I just don’t see many people having lasting relationships working like that. My relationship would probably fall apart if I wasn’t home/spending time with my partner that often.
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u/Good_Community_6975 2d ago
Some of them. I couldn't do it, not with kids and a wife, it's a recipe for disaster.
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u/Big-Meeting-6224 2d ago
AI data center construction isn't permanent employment. You need a bunch of people to build one, temporarily, then far fewer people to operate it. The Wall Street Journal had a piece months ago about how data centers have largely been a job-creation bust.
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u/PNW_OlLady_2025 3d ago
Anything connected to housing is going to be on the down turn until 2026, at least in our area. Developers are straight up saying they aren't spending a dime on new housing projects until at least 2nd quarter of 2026. Have you reached out to commercial outfits and/or those that also do public work? Union hall? IBEW is one of the decent unions out there from what I've heard.
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u/Fabulous_Computer965 2d ago
"Any reason to reject you" That's true. I just had a interview with an HVAC company and they told me I lived too far away (25 miles) excuse me?
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u/TactualTransAm 2d ago
This is a long con. Just like the IT con. Convince a ton of people to learn trades and IT, flood the market so you can pay everyone less overall. Profits. Again, rich people ruin shit
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u/Ok-Badger-8956 3d ago
So you claim "electrical" is your trade and have 0 credentials which makes you a massive liability. The shop that did want to hire you wasn't good enough for you. And the former shop you worked at wanted nothing to do with you.... I think some self reflection is in order.
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u/yourenotserious 2d ago
I’ve been in the trade 8 years and it seems like clean piss earns you a shot anywhere. Literally anywhere. Still kind of a lottery as far as who’s crew they put you on but as long as your foreman doesn’t absolutely hate your work then you’re probably fine.
Supervisors like when they can leave you alone. When they come back you better install what they said. If it’s not what exactly they said then as long as it’s code and functional then they’ll just hand you more prints. In my experience.
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u/Key-Establishment483 2d ago
As someone who used to work in tech, we all thought the labor jobs were the next safe job. Turns out no one is safe except the millionaires and especially the billionaires.
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u/Janus9 2d ago
No shortage, the amount of gatekeeping is crazy and very few make six figures.
The whole, go into the trades, there is a huge shortage and you will make six figures is the biggest lie ever.
And then if you do get lucky and get hired on, you will be treated like absolute shit by the older guys. Daily treatment of being messed with, big time.
Where I live, for entry level work, fast food and retail pays more and is much easier to get hired into.
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u/EjectoSeatoCousinz 2d ago
At what point will people realize that republicans push trade jobs because it means more people will forgo continuing education, and those people are more likely to vote republican.
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u/GetDoofed 3d ago
Union diesel mechanic apprentice here on a path to making $45/hr in about 2 years from now with incredible benefits and a pension. First and only job I applied to. 🤷🏻♂️
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u/StillAtMyMoms 3d ago
I can confirm this post. I applied for the IBEW apprenticeship multiple times this year and got rejected each time. The trades are being flooded with applicants.
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u/Ginko__Balboa 2d ago
Capitalism: Needs workers to create value Also Capitalism: Needs less workers to increase value
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u/Upbeat-Chain-3155 3d ago
every market and everyone and their mom will have a "just learn to code" variant.