High-school shop students attract skilled-trades job offers

College vs. Trades and Who They Compete For

• Several argue trades, the military, and college now compete for the same reasonably smart, middle‑class students; trades are not an “option for the non‑academic.”
• Modern trades (welding, machining, HVAC, electrical) increasingly require math, geometry, programming CNC, reading codes and technical docs.
• Others suggest poor curricula and safety/HR constraints make shop feel like abstract book‑learning, so only already‑strong students thrive.

Pay, $70k Claims, and Working Conditions

• Many are skeptical of the article’s “$70k for high‑schoolers” framing, comparing it to touting rare FAANG offers for bootcamp grads.
• Typical pattern described: base pay in the low‑ to mid‑$20s/hour, need for heavy overtime to approach $70k+, and much higher figures only in niche, harsh roles (offshore, underwater, food‑grade, etc.).
• Multiple personal examples show tradespeople doing well, especially those who move into management or own shops; others report small shops “barely hanging on” and boom‑bust cycles where workers are “meat for the grinder.”
• Physical toll is a recurring theme: back/knee problems, fumes, long‑term disease risk; when your body fails, income often stops unless you have union protection or move off the tools.

Class, Politics, and the “College vs. Trades” Culture War

• Some see conservative rhetoric reframing college as “useless indoctrination” and trades as a culture‑war totem, even as elites still send their kids to selective universities.
• Others counter that universities are gatekeepers of a class system and that “liberals” built the administrative state.
• Debate over whether “liberal indoctrination” is real: some cite overt political behavior in gen‑ed classes; others say that’s anecdotal and that college mainly attracts people already inclined toward broader, critical education.
• Broader concern about anti‑intellectualism and resentment of “intellectual elites” feeding current politics.

Shop, CTE, and Tracking Systems

• Availability of high‑school shop/CTE in the US is highly uneven; some districts have rich programs tied to community colleges, others eliminated shop as “obsolete” or used it as a dumping ground for low performers.
• Comparisons to German and Polish tracking systems: they can produce strong tradespeople but may hard‑lock class paths early; US gifted/“college prep” tracks are said to have similar effects.

Career Strategy and Life Choices

• One camp: trades + business skills = best path today; “slightly smarter than average with work ethic and entrepreneurial drive” can do very well.
• Another camp: strong warning against romanticizing trades; survivorship bias, limited promotion slots, and health risks mean many never reach owner/manager status.
• Some advocate “learn a trade then a profession” as an ideal hedge: a direct way to meet basic needs plus a degree for flexibility; others note licensing, capital, and opportunity cost make that non‑trivial.
• Tension between pride in tangible work and the relative comfort, longevity, and flexibility of desk jobs; several commenters who grew up in trades ultimately moved into IT or engineering for those reasons.

Economic and Structural Context

• High housing costs make $68–70k look thin, especially in places like the Bay Area; others note that’s above US median personal income and can be attractive outside high‑COL metros.
• Private equity consolidation in HVAC and other trades raises fears of “Walmart‑ification” of trades work, though some think low barriers to starting small shops will limit that.
• Automation and AI are seen as real threats for some white‑collar roles and parts of CAD/CNC, but many believe on‑site physical trades will be harder to fully disrupt.