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  • oldag

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    7   0   0
    Feb 19, 2015
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    I Pipefitters, Machinists, millwrights, painters, electricians, instrument techs, plant operators, insulators, etc. We all made about the same wages. About $10-13 an hour. It wasn't great money but it allowed you to have a place to live, a vehicle, even start a family and not have to live in a cardboard box under the bridge.
    Here it is almost 40yrs later and most of those jobs are filled by people STILL making $10-13 an hour.

    Agree that college is overhyped. It is not for everybody.

    But machinists, plant operators making $10/ hour now? Not from what I have seen, but perhaps true some places.
    DK Firearms
     

    easy rider

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    I agree with you.
    Its a couple of generations of kids being told you're less than pond scum if you work with your hands.
    You HAVE to go to college.

    Another thing is lower level job wages have been kept at shit levels for 30+yrs because of illegal immigration.
    If a kid has a choice of digging ditches or working at a place making coffee with A/C for the same wages, where do you think the kid is going to work?
    Way back almost 40yrs ago when I started in industry there were a multitude of craftsmen. Pipefitters, Machinists, millwrights, painters, electricians, instrument techs, plant operators, insulators, etc. We all made about the same wages. About $10-13 an hour. It wasn't great money but it allowed you to have a place to live, a vehicle, even start a family and not have to live in a cardboard box under the bridge.
    Here it is almost 40yrs later and most of those jobs are filled by people STILL making $10-13 an hour.
    Somebody is making HUGE bucks but it damn sure isn't the working guys.
    Who the hell wants to be a hydroblaster for $10 an hour?
    If you are a skilled craftsman and all you are finding is jobs $10- 13 an hour, maybe you should move.
     

    V-Tach

    Watching While the Sheep Graze
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    Welders here do quite well....but the demand can be cyclable.....off shore and underwater welders......very good money...
     

    easy rider

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    Welders here do quite well....but the demand can be cyclable.....off shore and underwater welders......very good money...
    What many people don't understand about underwater welding and why it pays so well is that it's extremely dangerous and the duration of a career like that is approximately 5 years. So many students hear about the pay, but don't understand the danger or the expense of training for such a short career.
     

    pronstar

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    What many people don't understand about underwater welding and why it pays so well is that it's extremely dangerous and the duration of a career like that is approximately 5 years. So many students hear about the pay, but don't understand the danger or the expense of training for such a short career.

    What are their careers so short?


    Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk Pro
     

    jrbfishn

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    Shortage of workers is an issue in every field where working with your hands is required.
    Shortage of people willing to work period is a problem. Too many people, even educated people, think that showing up is all that is required for a paycheck. Something I here quite a bit, even from people that will do almost nothing more strenuous than write on paper is "they don't pay enough to think or work, just show up".

    Yeah, right.

    Sent by an idjit coffeeholic from my SM-G892A using Tapatalk
     

    Wildcat Diva

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    Husband and I will he hauling the two younger sons to the community college three nights a week to study welding/ machining.

    Next year when they are both driving our lives might be less stressful. Or more, who knows?
     

    Darkpriest667

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    9   0   0
    Jan 13, 2017
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    Working at such depths and continuously decompressing does bad things to your body.


    Beat me to it. Decompression sickness is not good for you. Constantly being in a decompression tank for days on end is definitely not good for you.

    By the way, I'd love to work some of these labor jobs with my hands, but you guys have seen me. I was not built to do it or else I would. God didn't give me the body to be able to do that kind of work. I did some manual labor in my late teens and early twenties, but there is no way my body could have taken doing that for 20 years.
     

    Southpaw

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    14   0   0
    Mar 30, 2009
    17,849
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    Guadalupe Co.
    Oh I KNOW. As we speak the nineteen year old is driving the seventeen year old to a concert in Austin.

    Good luck Austin!! :roflfunny:
    destroyed_city_by_shadowyingzhi-d3ee065.jpg
     

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    Wildcat Diva

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    Agree that college is overhyped. It is not for everybody.

    But machinists, plant operators making $10/ hour now? Not from what I have seen, but perhaps true some places.
    Probably depends where you are. I’m in the same location as Moonpie, and machinists make much more than that, according to BLS. This area has high demand, too.

    The seventeen year old son is doing Machinist/ shop helper work. He’s only making $8 an hour, but keep in mind he doesn’t have any experience and offered to help out at the shop for free to learn. They asked him what he thought he was worth to be paid hourly and he rightly told them about minimum wage because he’s green as can be and is looking to learn. Hell he’s not really even supposed to be in there at 17.
    So $8 it is.

    We are very pleased. He won’t be stuck at that for long. He has a co-op job placement (somewhere else) that’s TBA over the next year or two, after he’s 18.

    Now the eldest, he’s NOT a tradesman type. He’s more of a male version of me, as far as aptitudes and bent. So college it is. So he’s studying psychology but he can’t stand people. So that’s pretty wow. His choice tho.

    He may add in computer tech skills, and graphic design skills and try this career, which can use a BS in Psychology as your base.

    https://skillcrush.com/2018/02/28/how-much-is-a-ux-designer-salary/
     

    txinvestigator

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    Unemployment is at a 50 year low. Pretty much anyone who wants to work is working. The demand for workers outnumbers the available workers.

    We have a very though time hiring, and people will leave for just a few bucks more.
     
    Every Day Man
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