This article at Atlantic by Paul Tough made me unhappy for a number of reasons:
Despite the sunny claims of The Wall Street Journal and Marco Rubio, the real-life welding jobs that Orry was able to find in western North Carolina were paying experienced welders between $12 and $15 an hour, which was less than he was making at the door factory. Orry knew that better-paying welding jobs existed, but they were far away and short-term and physically arduous, and if he went out and chased one, he’d have to leave his kids behind. Now that he was back together with Katie and they had what felt like a genuine family, he wanted to stay close to home and be a real father. Besides, even those well-paying welding jobs didn’t pay that well—maybe $30 or $40 an hour, if he got lucky.
This is the other glaring flaw at the heart of the case for welding as the ideal alternative to college. The overwhelming majority of American welders are not earning $150,000 a year. Not even close. According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the average annual salary for an experienced welder in 2018 was a little more than $41,000 a year—which was only about $16,000 above the poverty line for a family of four.
The good thing about welding as a profession is that it has a relatively high salary floor. You’re almost always going to make more than minimum wage, even starting out. But the downside, economically, is that welding has a pretty low salary ceiling. Welders at the 90th percentile of income for the profession, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, earn $63,000 a year before taxes. Those are, statistically, the top earners, and they are usually expert welders with decades of experience. The salaries that make headlines in The Wall Street Journal are somewhere between rare and apocryphal.
There’s also an article at FiveThirtyEight by Farai Chideya on the very same subject that makes the very same point in a more FiveThirtyEight-ish way:
Since people with philosophy degrees do many things, one way to track them is by earnings regardless of their day job. According to American Community Survey data, the median earnings of full-time year-round employees ages 30-49 with a bachelor’s degree in philosophy, and no graduate degree, was $51,000 per year from 2010 to 2012. In addition, the Department of Labor (DOL) also keeps statistics on what people earn by job category. “Philosophy and Religion Teachers, postsecondary†earn, on average, $71,350 (and presumably many are college professors with graduate degrees and the associated time-commitment and/or debt). The DOL’s figures show that “Welding, Soldering and Brazing Workers†make $39,570 on average. Two other job categories including “welding†or “welder†have median wages of $40,040 and $36,450.
The first thing that bothered me was the title of the Atlantic piece: “Welding won’t make you rich”. If your objective to to be rich, there’s nothing that beats getting a job with a big financial services company. Of course to do that you’ll need to get an MBA from one of the Top 15 B-schools and those are very selective. It helps in getting into those schools if you’ve graduated from an Ivy school, preferably Harvard, Yale, or Princeton. Those are pretty selective, too. And to get into those Ivies it helps if you’ve graduated from a top prep school—even more selectivity not to mention expense. Kiss in the low five figures worth of educational debt goodbye. Or you could be a pro basketball player or a plastic surgeon, orthopedic surgeon, or other top-paying medical specialty. There are fewer than 500 pro basketball players in the U. S. and about 7,000 board certified plastic surgeons. Translation: unless you’re very, very good you won’t make it.
That’s the first awful truth. The odds are that you won’t get rich.
Here’s some more. There are about 130 million workers in the U. S.
| Percentage of workers | Number | Earning Threshold |
| Top 10% | 13 million | $118,400 |
| Top 1% | 1.3 million | $719,766 |
| Top .1% | 130,000 | $2,757,000 |
I’ll leave it to you to decide which of those is rich. The median income for a family of four is around $55,000. For most people the rung above you is rich. Wages of $41,000 are a nice, middle class salary. If your wife is a welder and you have a minimum wage job, between the two of you you’re above the median.
Here’s the next one. If you gave every person in the United States $2 million, that wouldn’t make us all rich. To make us all rich you’d need to increase what we’re producing by $2 million per year in real terms. Otherwise prices will just rise and everybody will be right back where we started.
Finally, there’s this. According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics there are 398,000 welders and 23,000 philosophy and religion teachers. Being a welder is a growth field and being a professor of philosophy is not. Basically, to get a job a professor of philosophy has to die.
Which of those areas do you think you’re more likely to get a job doing? I don’t give a darn what Marco Rubio said or what the Wall Street Journal says. We need to stop putting jobs that require a decade of higher education on a pedestal while thinking of blue collar jobs as demeaning.
And I haven’t even gone into standard deviation.
You might have to go to where the jobs are? Heaven forbid.
In any event, I heard two ads on the radio yesterday. One for Walmart and one for some outfit called Schneider, each for truck drivers. They were touting roughly $90k/yr to start. I don’t know what the difficult work issues are for truck drivers. I just know that most jobs have them. We have graduated from there are no jobs to the jobs come with issues to they are not glamorous enough. Shorter: we’ve lost our minds.
We have become candy assed whiners and it’s a self inflicted wound. No sympathy here.
The article was in response to the claim that welders are making $150,000/year, so it seems like a fair title to me. It seems to do a fair job of indicating that you will make an OK salary, and that you will have job opportunities, but it won’t make you rich. It also points out that the education you need to become a welder will cost you a lot more since states have cut funding for vocational programs.
“on a pedestal while thinking of blue collar jobs as demeaning.”
This article, like most of these I have seen written, goes out of its way to praise welding as a profession. This seems pretty normal when talking about the trades. If you are going to see demeaning comments, they seem to be reserved for food service and retail.
Query- Why is this piece more disturbing than a WSJ article claiming that welders can make $150,000?
Steve
Maybe because I didn’t see the WSJ article but I did see this one. The author (or his editors) clearly wanted to grab my attention with the article’s title and they succeeded.
I think the author of the Atlantic piece goes our of his way to make it sound as though $41,000 a year were a pittance:
That is grossly misleading. $41,000 is a decent wage, particularly in western North Carolina. It also fails to take income distribution into account. The top of the income distribution bell curve is around $55,000. In most places that’s a decent income. I think he’s got Lake Wobegone syndrome.
Here’s another awful truth: not only is there an income distribution but there should be.
“That is grossly misleading. $41,000 is a decent wage, particularly in western North Carolina. ”
Not so sure about that. Note that the guy was making about $35,000 at the door factory, which doesn’t sound like it required any special training. It also didnt require experience. The article notes that welders in that area, according to the guy they interviewed were making $12-$15 per hour, or just a bit over $30k. Also, you need training to become a welder, and that costs money. Finally the article says $41 k for “experienced welders”. In case you missed it, here is what they said welders earn in that area of N Carolina. So in order to make that $41k, he probably would need to work several years in N Carolina at $25k-$31K a year before he could move to get $41k. So, is it whining to go to a trade school and find that you are making $25k, right at the poverty level?
“Despite the sunny claims of TheWall Street Journal and Marco Rubio, the real-life welding jobs that Orry was able to find in western North Carolina were paying experienced welders between $12 and $15 an hour, which was less than he was making at the door factory. Orry knew that better-paying welding jobs existed, but they were far away and short-term and physically arduous,”
Steve
“You might have to go to where the jobs are? Heaven forbid.”
That’s sure true, I’ve heard wild rumors of $200/HR for pipeline welders, you have to be good and you follow the pipeline only as long as the job lasts. High school grads can make $70,000 plus benefits at Burlington Northern, but you have to go where they want you, whenever they say.
Long haul truckers live in the cab, are away from home 7-10 days at a stretch, it’s tedious, and you MUST pass pre-employment and random drug tests. I don’t know how many candidates that last deters, but it must be significant.
I have a retired cousin, worked for a security firm, always on the road, many times long stretches in Saudi Arabia.(There’s nothing to do there, as not much is legal) but he made 6 figures with a high school diploma and company training.
So yes, I think everyone would like to make more money, but in most cases, they are just not hungry enough.
That money will go a long way in W N Carolina. Even near Asheville.
More generally, stick welding carbon steel for repair or simple construction is something any Tom, Dick or Harry can do. I know. I’ve done it and I’m not even trained as a welder. TIG welding aluminum for aerospace applications, or, say, pressure vessel quality is a different ballgame requiring significant training and experience. One would expect different pay levels; different work locations etc. Income distribution within the same supposed profession. And after all, I can and have been seen by a PA for a run of the mill sinus infection. But if things aren’t working out as planned, I wind up in an ENT’s office for obvious reasons. I don’t think the pay grades are the same. Nor will a PA or ENT charge the same if practicing in NYC or Monroe, NC. (look it up) Income distribution.
Shorter: the Atlantic guy had an ax to grind and wrote a piece of shit article.
Multiple axes to grind. Let’s stipulate that Marco Rubio is an idiot. That’s something we should all be able to grind. And that not every welder earns $150,000 a year and that claiming they do is irresponsible and wrong.
But being a welder pays a decent wage and it’s a lot easier to get a job as a welder than at teaching philosophy even with ten years of higher education and associated educational debt.
I would add that I don’t think that we need more welders than philosophers. I think we need more welders who are philosophers.
“Multiple axes to grind. Let’s stipulate that Marco Rubio is an idiot. ”
Let’s not forget the WSJ for helping to spread the story so that now it is widely believed. I would sum it up as you can earn a decent wage, once you have experience, but you may have to move since in some areas you won’t make much above poverty level wages. Also, the costs of training in this trade have increased substantially.
Steve
An awful truth is not only that our education system works for only half of the population, leaving the rest to feel like they deserve their place in the “meritocracy,” but also there are employment opportunities that don’t need to go through the college.
The local community college issues an intermediate welding certificate in one semester for $3,069. More advanced certifications are also available. One of my partners got her semi-truck driving license there.
I think it’s more like 30%, PD, but yeah.
As a guy who sweat like a pig in the summer, froze his ass off in the winter, survived a steam explosion and sucked smoke on a routine basis in a steelmaking shop – all while holding a BS in engineering – I certainly don’t look down on “blue collar work,” whatever that means to people. The real question of course is how do we tailor educational opportunities and general economic growth to the realities of our workforce and, now, international competition.
I don’t know. And I don’t know if the system serves 20% – 30% or 60%. But I do know a few things. A) you don’t have the government promoting foo-foo industries and positions (that means all you environmental whackjobs) or, B) you don’t subsidize loan programs that result in worthless degrees (and benefit construction firms, administrators etc) and then……when the error of your ways is on display, forgive the loans on taxpayer dollars, C) you don’t promote willy-nilly immigration that undercuts the general wage structure of blue collar jobs.
I had my daughter’s quarter million dollar college education in the bank at least 15 years ago. I know its not really worth $250K; but those are the current rules. How many can do that? Yes, let’s stipulate that Rubio is an idiot. But Bernie, Lizzy, Joe etc, and all their proponents, must be twice as stupid, or just plain evil, to be pandering to voters, or being the voters who support them, on the student loan issue. This stuff has real consequences. They are raping a wide swath of the public who don’t have my means.
Welders, carpenters, bricklayers, fork lift operators, truck drivers, maintenance workers…………..its all fine and noble work. We don’t need another poly-sci, philosophy or women’s studies prof. That, folks, is the very definition of misallocation of resources. Brought to you courtesy of government meddling.
” pandering to voters, or being the voters who support them, on the student loan issue. ” “forgive the loans on taxpayer dollars”
First, I am a bit hesitant about telling students they arent qualified to to go to college. If their grades and test scores are OK, they should have the right to take a shot even if they fail. Second, I have long supported loans not going to schools where students are not graduating, getting jobs and not being able not pay back loans. We had even passed some laws/regulations so that schools in that category could not receive loan money. Unfortunately, that was reversed by the Trump admin since they support for profit schools, even when they have bad results and what was that phrase? Rape a wide swath of the public who dont have any means.
“you don’t promote willy-nilly immigration that undercuts the general wage structure of blue collar jobs.”
Then maybe do something that might lessen that, like a strong E-verify program and look at hiring practices.
Steve
If we’re going to subsidize higher education, we should impose price controls on college tuitions. I favor neither but we’ve seen this movie before.
A better solution might be to ban requiring applicants to disclose which college they attended on employment applications.