September 8, 2004
YOU MEAN I HAVE TO LEARN SOMETHING AND THEN GET DIRTY?:
Trade services jobs attractive to middle-aged workers (VICTOR GODINEZ and JAMIE GUMBRECHT, September 6, 2004, The Dallas Morning News)
Workers in trade services – including welders, machinists, auto mechanics and air conditioning repair people – are in high demand right now, industry experts say.Ironically, as younger people are increasingly turning away from such manual labor, the void is being filled in part by middle-aged people, like Mr. Mulley, who are in need of work or just a change of pace.
ATI offers classes in automotive repair, welding, and air conditioning, heating and refrigeration at its facility near Love Field. While the classrooms are full, few of the students are fresh out of high school.
"What we've found is that there's a huge demand from the adult population," said Harry Dotson, chief information officer for ATI.
Many students attending technical programs at Dallas County Community College District schools are also older, switching from jobs that may have supported a single person fresh from high school but not a family or house payments, district officials said.
Mr. Dotson said job security is one of the biggest attractions for those considering a career as a welder or mechanic.
"You can't outsource that to Delhi," he said. "There are always going to be automotive dealerships and automotive repair shops."
They will eventually be filled by immigrants though because natives look down on the work and don't want to put the effort into acquiring the skills. Posted by Orrin Judd at September 8, 2004 8:19 PM
So true. You just don't see that many Indian auto mechanics or plumbers.
Posted by: NC3 at September 9, 2004 11:05 AMI'm in one of those high-tech computer jobs (lucked out into a specialty that has some job security -- 17 years at the same company), and all I can say is "At least you can see and hold what you're working on!" I wish my job had that anchor to the physical.
We computer geeks are like the Wizards of old (and I don't mean Gandalf or Saruman) -- to tread water in our art, we have to force our minds down so many esoteric paths we soon have little contact or understanding with physical reality. Off in our little towers, working our arcane magick (go ahead, try to tell me C++ isn't some sort of arcane magickal spells and runes), isolated from all other reality. (Just try to talk with a C++ type -- the only non-alphabet-soup-jargon magick-spell word you'll hear is "object", which can literally mean anything.) Cyberpunk fiction called it "Cyberpsychosis", I think it's actually under several psych names including "Internet Addiction".
And "natives" don't just look down on just manual labor. I've taken septic tanks full of crap for not being into Whatever Is The Latest Trendy Thing in Computers! Computers! Computers!
Posted by: Ken at September 9, 2004 12:46 PM