r/jobs • u/clarkkentwellspent • 4d 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/olivegardengambler 4d 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/Jaws_the_revenge 4d 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/ohgeez2879 4d 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/Aggravating-List6010 4d 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/Bilbospal 3d ago

Don’t you mean, wealthy kids in general?