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I stumbled into the power of apprenticeships, and I heartily agree with sentiments of this article.

When my eldest was 17, he told me that he didn't think he wanted to pursue college. I asked him what sort of career path he wanted to explore. He said, aviation. (He'd always been fascinated with flying things...drones, planes, hawks). He told me he could become an airframe and powerplant mechanic (AMP) by logging 4000 hours under supervision of a certified AMP and passing an FAA exam. Once certified he could afford to pay for flight lessons.

Well, he certainly had a more profound career plan than I did when I was 17. He's now 18 and just past the half-way point to get his AMP certification. He still enjoys the work...and getting paid to learn about his passion.

My second son is 16 and has been working as a full-time carpenter for a year and a half. He loves the work and plans to run his own crew next year. But he's also interested in college and plans to enroll in introductory chemistry and physics course at the local community college. While he didn't matriculate through a formal apprenticeship, I think the work experience has helped him understand the aspects of the world he'd really like to explore, maybe formally in college, or informally in his hobbies (wood and leather working).

Personally, I wasted a lot of time (and money) at a university. I think I may have been better off going to work, first. I think the workplace forces a focus on: what can I do to add value, what do I want to do, what am I good at? Having a better awareness of oneself might help us get more out of our higher education or help us find a different path to a career.

Thank you for the insightful article.

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Hi it's me again. lol. I'm a community affiliate research coordinator and very curious about this topic. Got a few questions and thoughts here:

1. How exactly do we define "apprenticeship"? What differentiates this from internship? For instance, what about a coding bootcamp? That seems like an apprenticeship, but is it?

2. Also, while we wait for policy to happen, what are some ways to encourage organizations to take the steps to be ready for a formal apprenticeship?

3. Similar to the coding question, are there ways to transform jobs that are traditionally only accessible through college into jobs that can be accessed through internships? I'm thinking of orgs like yearup and opportunity @ work that offer internships at fortune 500 companies that break the "paper ceiling"

would love to have this discussion with everyone here hehe

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Hi! Thought this made it in but didn't: all the stats here refer to "RAP's"--registered apprenticeship programs. They have to be registered with the Department of Labor or a state agency and have specific requirements for what counts. There are definitely more informal apprenticeships out there if we mean a "mentorship, training, then graduation to full employee" system, it's just that the ones here are the ones tracked by the DOL and can be influenced through funding, etc. Link here: https://www.apprenticeship.gov/employers/registered-apprenticeship-program

So RAPs are different from internships in that they have pay, *required supplemental education*, mentorship, and credentialing standards and are officially vetted and approved as programs. Right now, a lot of that work is done by private organizations like JFF who work with companies to help develop the formal programs. It takes a lot of explaining/convincing because it is a big investment.

To your 3rd question, I think convincing companies to invest in bootcamps/workforce development programs rather than pure recruiting. I'm sure a lot of top firms will be hesitant to change because they have a stable pipeline for college grads, but for the rest of the firms I think it will require the tough task of producing a large-scale culture shift towards workforce development while being nudged by policy incentives. There are some examples of what programs like this could look like: like this from the Hartford https://www.thehartford.com/careers/claims-apprentice. They don't even have to be full substitutes for a college education, but rather a "I'll hire someone with a high school diploma and train them to work *while* they are supplemented by additional education" instead of the education being divorced from the job.

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Nov 13, 2023·edited Nov 13, 2023Author

Personally, I hope these kinds of models can get in the door for jobs that traditionally require a degree. I personally know several people who think the only way to get into industries like software/website development without going back for a degree is to study and try to start your own business. It would be great if we found a middle ground where workers who want these skills don't just have to go for it themselves, which is risky, but can be trained by companies without going back to school.

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My question for this and any other research on underemployment is how "employment" is measured... Is that a measure of how many people are on W2s?

If so, I have a feeling that we're doing more handwringing than necessary. The internet has developed such that there are a great many people who are able to replace "employement" with entreprenurial income.

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I think the apprenticeships should be highly tech-oriented and focused on being remote. We shouldn’t put men into apprenticeships for work that is physical labor that machines and AI will be able to do in the near future.

“Apprenticeship” is basically a substitute for what companies used to do more often, which is invest in their employees job training. Maybe that will shift, but we also need a robust safety net.

We need a UBI by now. I don’t believe men or woman and built for the plethora of jobs in our economy that are becoming redundant. And honestly, have had a negative effect on society and our ability to connect.

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Agreed Paul, my mind went directly to how productivity is seen as the enemy of employee job training in many work settings young people can enter today like startups. It'd be interesting to study how productivity compares in internships vs. apprenticeships. I believe our young people are stuck in the mire of internships where they're undervalued, underpaid, undersupported, and as a result probably contribute a whole lot less productivity.

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It’s hard to imagine AI replacing the classic trades (plumbing, electrical, carpentry, HVAC) although I’m sure it will have an impact. Virtually all the men I know in the trades lead more grounded lives with less anxiety than my friends with 4 year degrees. They can also fix anything that breaks.

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Good point.

What does the anxiety stem from?

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Generally speaking their anxiety stems from how unreliable the market is for jobs requiring college degrees and the associated debt. A four year degree has never had a lower ROI - it’s basically what a high school diploma used to be (especially BAs). My trade friends know that no matter how bad things get they always have a wad of cash from side jobs and a deer tag. Most IT systems architects don’t.

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That was my thought exactly. It's super hard to find a good carpenter or electrician these days!

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That was precisely the point Mr. Shermer was making in his essay. As an electrician on the brink of retirement, my colleagues and I have a difficult time finding qualified tradesmen to fill our shoes. Because of the deemphasis on trades and the push for college degrees over the last 25 years, there is an immense shortage of men and women with the background and skills to build, maintain and repair our nations infrastructure.

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With the rise in A.I how many jobs are ceasing to exist each year? With a shrinking demand for labour, and more women competing in both education and the workplace, men are suffering. George Gilder writes: "The society thus has a much larger stake in employing young men than in employing young women. The unemployed man can contribute little to the community and will often disrupt it, but the woman may even do more good without a job than with one." Apprenticeships have long been an answer, a way to close the gap in both education and employment. The government certainly need to invest more.

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Gilder is one of my favorite polymaths. I believe he wrote this in the early 80s? I sense from my time on campuses that women have found more agency and are more disruptive now. They are the face of social activism. Men perhaps even less so.

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Yes, the original book was entitled Sexual Suicide, but I think pressure from the feminist movement prevented the book from continuing as such, so it was revised, renamed men and marriage, and re-published in 1998, I believe. An epic work from him. He managed to strike an incredible balance between saying what needed to be said, and maintaining a relevance and respect for the open minded female reader. It's a book that will forever be relevant.

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