this post was submitted on 28 May 2026
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They also completely fuck up your body and are entirely off the table for anyone with disabilities. And I guess anyone who doesn’t want to be disabled at 45. The rate of drug use in the trades due to pain is HUGE.
Trades, like college, are not for everyone, and should not be pushed to everyone as a solution or they won’t be lucrative anymore. Like lawyers in the 90s and IT today, by the time people, en masse, start saying everyone should do it, because it pats super well, enough people are in training, or planning to be, that the next wave to start is likely to be the last to make good money, and the wave after will bring everyone else down as well (arguably good at the moment because getting work done is ridiculously expensive, but not great long term for people in those jobs). I know several young people who are going into either trades or nursing. And that’s great, if that’s what they want to do.
But the thing is, people used to be able to support themselves without college and without trades. Every job used to pay a livable wage, thats literally what minimum wage in the US is supposed to be, the minimum required to live a decent life. Hell, if you go back far enough, like just to the 60s or so, people could work for the summer and spend the rest of the year traveling or going to college, and be totally fine. Now only a small portion of jobs pay anything resembling survivable wages, to say nothing of livable ones.
Exactly. Working a trade isn't this magical cheat code where you're paid well to drink coffee and fuck the dog. It's hard work, and although I hate to say it, those old timers are right about one thing: you can't (and won't if you're doing it right) have soft hands.