Bright Raven
Well-known member
Draper":248x5504 said:There's definitely a shortage of skill-- you can want to frame a house all you want but without any training, you're not going to get much done. Modern k-12 education prepares students for private sector employment in service and technology.. Unfortunately, those that lack the capacity to excel in those industries really struggle as they have never had any exposure or training to anything else. K-12 needs to accept that everyone is not "college material" and bring back the trades: plumbing, electrical, carpentry, auto mechanics, auto body, etc. I know several millennials in these trades and they are ALL doing exceptionally well-- but the kicker is that the only millennials I know that fall into this category are ones that had the luxury of growing up in the family business and thus got the exposure/training necessary to make a career out of it. Another prohibiting factor is inflation: look at any purchasing power calculator. In the baby boomer's heyday, young men could support a household on apprentice/journeymen wages.. Today, fulfilling this same role you'd be hard pressed to afford a 1 bedroom apt. Compensation at the top has skyrocketed. In the early 70s, CEO compensation was around 30 times that of avg employee. Today, that number is 300 times. The fat cats have become accustomed to discounted labor costs via immigrants... Wages will have to increase in order for trade jobs to ever have the appeal they once had-- Paying skilled framers/plumbers $14/hr isn't going to cut it
Comment on the top end salaries: Amazing how many Corporate Executives make more than that many employees under them.