In praise of manual labor. - PeachParts Mercedes-Benz Forum

kerry · #1 10-02-2006, 04:35 PM

Working at a school where the automotive and diesel programs were closed down in the 1990's to adapt to a knowledge economy, I found the following piece insightful:

http://www.thenewatlantis.com/archive/13/crawford.htm

Pete Geither · #2 10-02-2006, 06:18 PM

Kerry, did not get through the whole article, but I think I have a pretty firm grasp on its' contents. It sums up what we in the service sector have been seeing for years. There are no young people entering the professions and I truly wonder who is going to fix anything in the very near future. The average age of a technician in autobody or mechanical repair I believe, is right around 54 to 56.

What does that tell you ? As in the article our techs and myself take a lot of pride in figuring things out and doing a job right. Why that trait seems to be disappearing is beyond me. One reason I do see around here is because a LOT of the young crowd is on drugs. I am content to know that I probably won't be around to see the way things are in 20 years or so.

Botnst · #3 10-02-2006, 06:52 PM

It bothers me. The result is two problems: Good technically competent people get bad training OJT (most companies cannot afford extensive training programs for entry-level techs) and academic institutions change their standards to accomdate curricula that would be better taught in technical schools.

B

Hatterasguy · #4 10-02-2006, 08:06 PM

I only read about half, they make an interesting point. I currantly work on boats and very often I judge my work and the work of others. Crap is crap, quality is quality. Often as I am working I think to myself, "is the next guy going to be impressed by my work, or think its crap?"

Not everyone is suited to college ect, there is nothing wrong with picking up a trade.

In the consumer society we have today very few people value quality, or even understand quality for that matter. To them if its new its automatically better.

TheDon · #5 10-02-2006, 08:16 PM

i like working with my hands.. reason i have engineering tech in high school and had shop in middle school..

kerry · #6 10-02-2006, 09:16 PM

Part of the reason was the push in the 90's by Robert Reich, Clinton's Secretary of Labor, who, in response to globalization and outsourcing, was essentially arguing that we need to turn the whole US workforce into a managerial class in. This required putting a far greater percentage of high school graduates into academic college programs. Technical jobs and manual labor were de-emphasized.
Another possible cause (although I risk the fate of Larry Sumner by suggesting it) is that the higher echelons of community college administration (at least in Colorado) have become dominated by women. They don't identify as well with plumbers, or mechanics. Engines are greasy and smelly. It was a female president who closed down our diesel, auto, and hydraulic pneumatic programs. We do however, still have one of the finest Woodworking programs in the country. Maybe it's because look good in a living room or a college foyer.

Kuan · #7 10-02-2006, 09:57 PM

I don't think the American public can recognize or appreciate the difference between quality craftsmanship and a cheap knockoff anymore. So many things these days are made to look flashy on the outside but crappy on the inside. Unique products have a limited lifespan before imitators hit the market and the novelty wears off. Give a new product a year or two and someone will find some way to commoditize it. Watches, bicycles, clothing, musical instruments, software, shoes, tools, coffee, and even services like the Geek Squad.

RobTheMod · #8 10-02-2006, 10:22 PM

Hear, hear!

I am a college grad (BA English/humanities) working as an ASE certified master technician. For now at least, I make better money than most of my contemporaries at the age of 30, and I enjoy the tangible nature of what I'm doing. Where the next generation of guys who know what they are doing will come from- who knows??

kerry · #9 10-02-2006, 10:32 PM

I find that intellectual labor can be satisfying but it doesn't produce the same kind of rewards that sewing a coat, installing a hardwood floor, or diagnosing a mechanical mystery can bring. Let's hear it for Marx and Homo Faber.

t walgamuth · #10 10-02-2006, 10:50 PM

there is a certain satisfaction from doing a mechanical repair. it is either right or not. total clarity.

now in the white collar world it is easy to, at the end of the day, say "what did i do today?". i talked on the phone walked around a bit drove around a bit and shuffled some papers. not very clear about what has been accomplished.

i have known a lot of men in the trades, carpenters, plumbers, electricians and equipment operators with advanced degrees. they just didnt enjoy working in their field that they took college for.

we tend to over emphasize college in our country i think. it isnt just riez who is the problem on this, it is all over our cultural spectrum. think of a tv show and how is the plumber or auto tech portrayed? usually as a beer drinking uncouth person. in my experience this is far from the truth. folks working in the trades are very intelligent and thoughtful.

kids believe they should start out at an executive position (like the old croce song 'working at the carwash blues'). hell we all thought that right?

when i got out of architecture school i was sure i was going to be the next frank lloyd wright. and when i went to work in the big firm WHAM! a big dose of reality. i had to draw tiolet details and window schedules like all the other recent grads. only after being at it for a year or three did i realize that what i had learned in school was just the beginning of what i needed to be a productive part of the process.

but i learned. we all do. or at least most of us do.

tom w

davestlouis · #11 10-02-2006, 10:57 PM

I work with body men who make more than several physicians I know, and the body men don't have $150K in school loans hanging over their heads. My parents' cleaning lady makes more cleaning houses than teaching high school English and doesn't have to deal with obnoxious teens anymore. Several of my kids don't look like college material to me, and while I have joked for years that I'm gonna send them to air conditioning school, it's starting to look like a good idea. One of my co-workers just got his son into the operating engineers' apprenticeship program: he'll be operating earthmoving equipment and dozers, and making a good wage. This is a kid who is none-too-swift, per his father, and would have never made it at Mizzou.

Hatterasguy · #12 10-02-2006, 11:10 PM

Last semester I had a class with an extremely good professor, he is extremely smart in his field, but that is tempered with 30+ years of the real business world. He actually started the business program at my school (SCSU) in the early 70's. Some kid made a crack about wages or something I forget how the conversation started. But the crack was along these lines. He said you know what the average business or accounting grad makes when they get out of school? I forget the exact number but its like $40k a year.

College degrees are a dime a dozen these days. You have a degree great! Sit in this cubical and do this for $40k a year. As you have $120k to pay off from going to fashionable schools. School really doesn't teach you much about the real world.

That’s why its sometimes nice to learn a trade, very often you can make more and have a darn good job in the process. There are shortages of skilled labor in certain fields, because of todays mindset about white color jobs.

t walgamuth · #13 10-02-2006, 11:16 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by davestlouis

I work with body men who make more than several physicians I know, and the body men don't have $150K in school loans hanging over their heads. My parents' cleaning lady makes more cleaning houses than teaching high school English and doesn't have to deal with obnoxious teens anymore. Several of my kids don't look like college material to me, and while I have joked for years that I'm gonna send them to air conditioning school, it's starting to look like a good idea. One of my co-workers just got his son into the operating engineers' apprenticeship program: he'll be operating earthmoving equipment and dozers, and making a good wage. This is a kid who is none-too-swift, per his father, and would have never made it at Mizzou.

what is a mizzou? please, dave.

tom w

PC Dave · #14 10-02-2006, 11:18 PM

Contributing is the ongoing transition from a mechanical or electro-mechanical world to a purely digital one. The skill-set, and to a degree the mindset, is different when auto repair consists of plugging in a $50k diagnostic tool and replacing a $2k module when it tells you to. Been to a steel plant or refinery lately? The crew is a small fraction of the size of a similar facility in the '50s, and largely consists of guys monitoring panels and controlling functions from a glass booth 50 feet above the floor. "Blue Collar" is being redefined, not always for the better.

PC Dave · #15 10-02-2006, 11:19 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by t walgamuth

what is a mizzou? please, dave.

tom w

University of Missouri. Oops, sorry, wrong Dave..