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Skilled Trades Need Better PR
by Mike Rowe, July 13, 2025x.com/mikeroweworks
https://tinyurl.com/5c9n52d4
My first two words on this particular Sunday morning were “Hallelujah!” followed by, “Amen!”
I was not in church when I uttered them. I was at my kitchen table, watching the CEO of the most valuable company in the world say precisely what mikeroweWORKS has been espousing for the last sixteen years. In other words, this is what I look like before coffee, when I find myself in violent agreement with a multi-billionaire.
If you haven’t already heard, a massive challenge is upon us. With regard to artificial intelligence and the energy we need to feed it, America will either change its current direction, or get left far, far behind. I know this because I run a modest foundation that has been arguing for decades that the portion of our workforce most often described as “the skilled trades,” will become the most essential component of our economy, our independence, and our collective future.
Well, the future is here.
Obviously, I didn’t know that the race to dominate artificial intelligence would be the thing that finally galvanized the folks at the grown-up table. When I founded mikeroweWORKS in 2008, I figured it would be a new commitment to rebuild our crumbling infrastructure that would necessitate a collective push to reinvigorate the trades.
That need is still pressing, but I never imagined the most urgent cry for more welders and electricians would be ushered in by the need for more data centers. Back then, I didn’t even know what a data center was. But today, here we are. Data centers are headline news, because they are – as Jensen Huang says – AI factories. And if we want to remain competitive with China, we need to build thousands of them. Now.
And presently, we simply don’t have the workforce to do it.
I’ll be discussing all of this next Tuesday in Pittsburgh, at the Energy and Innovation Summit, which is turning out to be a pretty high-profile event.
It looks like I’ll be joining a panel of elected officials, including the President, and dozens of well-known CEO’s to discuss Pennsylvania’s role in the energy renascence. A lot of money is being invested in Pennsylvania, (a LOT), and my message to those writing the checks will be no different than it’s been since we launched mikeroweWORKS:
“Set some of that money aside to make a more persuasive case for the work itself. The skilled trades need better PR, and they need it on a national level. The country needs to see thousands of examples – real world examples – of men and women who have prospered as a result of learning a skill that’s in demand.”
I first made this point to President Obama in an open letter to The White House in 2009, shortly after he promised 3 million “shovel-ready” jobs in his Highway Infrastructure Act. I was rooting for the President back then, and offered to use Dirty Jobs and mikeroweWORKS as vehicles to help promote his initiative. I did so because I was skeptical that people would line up to take those jobs simply because they were “created.”
“Filling three million shovel-ready jobs,” I wrote, “will be a lot easier if people feel enthused about the prospect of picking up a shovel. Investment alone, won’t create that kind of enthusiasm.”
The White House did not respond to my offer.
Understandably, most presidents do not seek the advice of marginally famous cable television hosts best known for crawling through sewers. But it’s worth remembering that the unemployment rate back then was over 10%. Millions of people were newly unemployed, and I think the former President assumed that creating three million shovel-ready jobs would translate to three million people going back to work.
But that’s not what happened. Because back then, even with record high unemployment, there were 2.3 million open jobs, most of which did not require a four-year degree. Nobody wanted to talk about that. Today, that number is more like 7.6 million. Nobody wants to talk about it now, either.
This is why I’m going to Pittsburgh. Just as I was rooting for President Obama in 2009, I’m rooting for President Trump today. I hope he succeeds in reinvigorating our industrial base and reshoring our manufacturing capabilities, and I want to offer my support. But if he does succeed, we’re talking about millions new jobs in manufacturing alone.
And currently, there are over 400,000 jobs in that sector that are currently open, begging the obvious question…
If we can’t fill the openings we have, how will we fill the one’s we’re about to create?
That’s the question I’ll pose in Pittsburgh.
I’ll let you know if anyone has an answer.
Mike
PS. Not to put too fine a point on it, but this change is truly upon us, and I’ve had a front row seat. Over the last six months, mikeroweWORKS been flooded with inquiries to collaborate on various recruitment initiatives and multiple industries. I mean, flooded. Not a week goes by that I don’t hear from an industry leader who has come to the realization that they’ve gone as far as they can go without more skilled labor.
Panic is not too strong a word. The Maritime Industrial Base for instance, is currently tasked with delivering three nuclear powered submarines to the Navy every year for the next decade, and looking to hire 140,000 tradespeople. 140,000!!!
“Do you know where they are?” they asked me. “We’ve looked everywhere.”
“Yes,” I said. “I know where they are. They’re in the 8th grade.”
I’ve had similar calls with the automotive industry, who needs 80,000 technicians and collision repair workers. Every single home service company is hiring – from foundation repair to roofing.
The energy industry is looking for hundreds of thousands of skilled workers, and so too is the construction industry. A few weeks ago, at something called The Aspen Ideas Festival, I heard Larry Fink, the CEO of Blackrock, say we’re short 500,000 electricians. A few months before that, at an Energy Conference in Newport, I heard Governor Rick Perry describe the race to build data centers and catch up to China with all things AI as nothing short of a “modern-day Manhattan Project.”
I think he’s right.
Part of the problem is an aging demographic. For every five skilled workers who retire, two replace them. That’s why we need to engage with eighth graders today. Maybe even before that. We have to make a persuasive case for these jobs to the next generation, and just as importantly, to their parents.
That won’t solve the immediate problem, but this is marathon, not a sprint, and these jobs need to be magnified and amplified at an early age. The more immediate problem is the labor force participation rate.
As we speak, millions of able-bodied Americans – for all sorts of reasons – are not working and not looking for work. According to economist Nick Eberstadt, that number is close to 7 million able-bodied men.
I’m not sure what to do about that, but it’s a colossal problem that needs to be addressed.
On the positive side, our last round of work ethic scholarships generated unparalleled interest. This year, mikeroweWORKSwill award $5 million to help train the next generation of skilled workers. That’s ten times the number of qualified applicants we got this time a year ago. The needle is moving, and I believe we can move it a lot further, with a little help from the companies most incentivized to see the trades reinvigorated.
Should be a lively conversation in The Keystone State…
Suzi’s note: https://mikeroweworks.org/ is Mike’s very awesome site. Scholarships and jobs are searchable and abundant there, and I’ll bet the President would be all over this. He’s been promoting a focus on trade school, and Mike’s efforts fit right in there neatly.