The Skilled Trades as ‘Smart’ Work
Most of us have a hard time defining why we are passionate about the things that we are passionate about. For those in the skilled trades, it often has something to do with the rewards of working with your hands, the intellectual stimulation of solving practical design challenges and seeing the tangible results of your labor at the end of the day.
The unfortunate reality, however, is that our educational system often leads students to believe that the skilled trades exist as career options for those students who can’t get admitted a traditional university.
If ever there was someone to put this myth to rest, it might be Matthew Crawford. With a PhD in political philosophy, Crawford quit his job as the executive director of a Washington D.C. think tank to open a vintage motorcycle repair shop.
Crawford discusses the satisfaction and fulfillment that he finds working with his hands and his mind to repair old motorcycles in his new book, “Shop Class as Soulcraft: An Inquiry Into the Value of Work.”
In a recent New York Times article, Crawford wrote:
The trades suffer from low prestige, and I believe this is based on a simple mistake. Because the work is dirty, many people assume it is also stupid. This is not my experience … I have found the satisfactions of the work to be very much bound up with the intellectual challenges it presents. And yet my decision to go into this line of work is a choice that seems to perplex many people.
Crawford’s experience seems to echo that of many people who enter the skilled trades not out of a lack of options, but out of a passion for the work.
Will we ever reach the point where the skilled trades are appropriately recognized for the intellectual challenges they offer? Do you know someone who quit their ‘white collar’ job to work in a ‘blue collar’ trade? Share your thoughts on these subjects by posting a comment below.
Average (Not Rated)
June 15th, 2009 at 10:20 am
I was one of those people who was told by the public school system that not only was university the surest route to success, it was the only route to success. The trades were very much downplayed as the option for those not smart enough to attend university.
This is total nonsense. The trades are full of intellectual challenges and require just as much analysis and acumen as any office job. As a site administrator for a heavy equipment manufacturer, I work with journeymen from all trades and I am convinced that any trade is just as, if not more, important to our economy and community than any degree in the humanities.
Tradesmen create wealth. University graduates create overhead.
July 3rd, 2009 at 8:31 am
Trades keep the world turning.
July 10th, 2009 at 10:42 am
I was an Auto Mechanics student in high school and continued on with it at a post secondary trade school. I went that route because I enjoyed the work not because of poor grades or an easy way out.
After I graduated I read an article in Reader’s Digest about a group of Automotive Vo-Ed high school students and how they “ were not very smart, but they sure were lovable!”. The article insinuated that this was typically the case with Vo-Ed students. I was appalled! And this was written by the father of one of the Students! It really bothered me that people might think of me as dim-witted because of my career path.
I eventually did decide to go to a 4 year college and I did well. The course work there was relatively easy compared to my tech school coursework.
With attitudes like what I read in Reader’s Digest it’s no wonder talented people shy away from trades.
July 21st, 2009 at 5:49 am
I am an Electronics Technologist, graduated top of the class with honours etc., working in the security industry for 7 yrs now designing and implementing high end commercial video, access, and burg systems. Since I have a passion for motorsports, last year I decided to expand my mechanical abilities and started an electric arc course. I was directed to start at the bottom since I had no experience, so I took that advice.
I have received some very conflicting reactions when I tell people I took a welding course. I suppose I am generally seen as an intellectual and people have a problem accepting that someone can actually WANT to work with their hands. It really is a bit of a shame that this misconception exists, the level of concentration and consideration when doing simple stick welding (well, doing it WELL) was surprising even to me when I first started. The welding trade is much more satisfying and mentally involved than I’d ever expected.
One of the best decisions I ever made was taking a chance to try something very different. Love the heat, as well.
August 23rd, 2009 at 7:54 pm
Its not so much the students of the trades that are being misled by the educational systems but those students entering the construction management, business, engineering and corperate world that led to conspire to “control cost” and devalue the journeyman.
Amen to Lance
September 11th, 2009 at 1:17 pm
I learned how to weld in High school won the welding award for industrial arts and went to work. I welded plate for five years in the plants and shops. I went to abc training center for 25 bucks a semester till I passed my pipe test while I worked and did that for a year then went to school for tig welding and passed that test on the job a year latter as I worked making top a class money the whold time. You have to want it. I made 30k a year from the beginning and got up to 60k as I progressed into pipe and alloys and welding in heaters ect. The past two and half years I made 169,000 a year about 340,000 during the whole time. Ecconomy is down now and I am home not traveling much at 82000 this year. That is more than most of those colleges teach you to make. Most millionares never even been to college. It is all about you drive and what you make of it no excusses unless you depend on the govt.
September 11th, 2009 at 1:18 pm
They can’t build it without us so don’t let them push you around welders or fitters.