Reply to Is the education 'crisis' in the USA overblown?

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[quote=Anonymous]I sort of agree.

I actually think that there are plenty of educated Americans, but there aren't enough Americans trained in trades (hard skills).  And that is where we are going to see a deficit.  I also think there aren't enough engineers, but the surprising thing is that engineering jobs don't seem to pay a salary that reflects that.

I think there is a disconnect.  The salaries don't match the value of the skill.  There are bloated salaries for amorphous, undefined management-esque jobs.  But the salaries for actual hard skills are very low.

For example, I know a skilled electrician who works in DC at a place that has some prestige.  He makes under 40k.  He has to live out in the exurbs.  And yet he tells me that they complained the last time they tried to hire a new electrician because they had trouble finding someone who was skilled and experienced and reliable.  But they were unwilling to set the salary higher, even though they employ lots of white-collar employees who do a lot of paper pushing for significantly higher salaries.  But they are stuck in the mindset that electrician is blue collar/labor.

My view is there is a disconnect.  It isn't even just salary, but level of respect.  So lots of people flock to certain fields (think law or even policy), and then there are hundreds of applicants for each position.

I actually think that focusing too much on traditional 4-year college education is the wrong approach as a country.  We should actually be doing more to bring back apprenticeships and training in trades.  And beyond that, we should change how we view those fields so that it isn't seen as "well, Johnny isn't smart enough for college, so he's going to go to trade school."  That's the wrong outlook.[/quote]

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