June 22, 2006
Wanted: Skilled tradesmen
I recently listened in on a conversation between two savvy people. One was our remodeling contractor who, having demolished my kitchen down to the studs, assures me he knows exactly how to put it back together better than ever. The other was my wife, a labor economist interested in possible shortages of trained construction workers.
Our contractor’s instantly identified the bottleneck, and it wasn’t at all what I’d been expecting. In his experienced opinion, the problem is our failure to tell high-school kids that becoming a carpenter (electrician, plumber, etc.) is a path to a good living and a job that gets respect. As we roll through graduation season, now is a good time to talk about both the good-living part and the respect part.
Carpenters start at $17 to $18 dollars an hour, plus benefits. That’s about the same wage that an under-30, four-year college graduate earns in Washington.
But is it a good career path? An experienced carpenter pulls down $28-$30 an hour. The median wage in Washington for someone over 30 with a bachelor’s degree is higher, but not by much, more like $32-$36 an hour. You don’t get rich being a carpenter, even with experience. But the living you make is just fine.
It’s the part about respect that needs attention. Apparently, many high-school kids hear a message that going to college is all that counts. Where did this screwy notion come from?
Every single Washington student should have the opportunity to go to college if they’re qualified. What’s more, we should encourage every high-school student to consider the college route. It’s especially important to advise students whose parents didn’t go to college. These “first generation” kids often don’t have the advantage of having someone who knows how the higher-education system works.
But encouraging kids to consider college has nothing at all to do with dissing the skilled-trade route. The paths are just different; one’s not somehow a higher calling than the other.
For that matter, there’s nothing wrong with both learning a trade and going to college. Education gives a person a great deal more than just a way to earn a living.
Because high schools have become increasingly focused on the academic side, they may not be the best way to expose students to non-college paths. Frankly, in many schools occupational education is treated as a joke. As a result, college-bound students are forced to take worthless occ-ed courses and trades-job-bound students end up in courses that don’t keep current with the needs of the marketplace.
No doubt, some occ-ed is done well. For the rest, the state might do a lot better diverting the money to pay for summer-apprenticeship programs.
Education is about opening options. For some teens, spending a couple of summer months on a construction crew will open their eyes to a viable career path. Others will learn they really are better off keeping to book-learning. Either way, something is gained.
When I asked my contractor how he’d feel about a couple of teenaged apprentices, he quickly made it clear that this would take some doing. Having unskilled hands on a construction job, even if they’re free, is no great favor to a contractor. Supervision costs money. Construction sites aren’t the safest place in the world for the uninitiated. There’s a reason this kind of work is called a “skilled” trade.
Companies aren’t going to rush to hire teenaged apprentices without some assistance. So there’s room for the state and the high schools to pair up with the companies who hire in the skilled trades, as well as with the unions and the community colleges that provide job training. Give students orientation to on-the-job behavior. Insure them at the job site. If necessary, maybe even subsidize employers a few bucks an hour for each summer apprentice.
Let’s be sure that our young people are being supported in all career choices, both with dollars and with encouragement.
