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Originally Posted by Appocomaster
Apparently now we have Polish people coming over to do plumbing and so on, because no one in the UK bothers now.
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Yeah I'm not really sure this is true (of course there are skilled immigrants coming to this country). Skill shortages do exist but their exact nature is almost always a projection at best (a guess at worst) and tend to be overhyped by businesses (who don't want the risk of higher wages) and organisations who have a vested interest in selling training courses.
With the specific example of plumbing there was considerable coverage in the media how the severe shortage of skilled plumbers had led to a scenario where plumbers could earn £70-100k (in London). There were even cases where people left city jobs in banking to retrain as plumbers in one of the (many) City & Guilds courses which promised fame and riches if one qualified. From what I've seen of the follow up stories most found this wasn't necessarily the case and their incomes were much more in line with what everyone else receives. Highly skilled plumbers with twenty years experience and a whole list of contacts might be able to make £100k, but this wouldn't necessarily be the norm. It's the same as those stupid adverts which promise £30k+ jobs after an eight-week IT course (no experience required!)
There are of course gaps in construction which are being filled by skilled workers from Eastern Europe, but a lot of this gap can be attributed to the scale of property-related boom especially in the South East.
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Our builder had an apprentice when he was here earlier this year, but he says there's not a huge amount of them around any more and this apprentice still wanted to go and do lots of courses at college.
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We have an apprentice and we're trying to get two established in housing management but yes they're not very common. I don't think they really "fit" anywhere. The pay is often laughable and so someone might find they still have to live at home (or rely on parental support) while having to deal with all the inconveniences of working full-time. Might as well choose to go to the University of ex-Poly, get into masses of debt, develop alcoholism and sleep with whatever you can (at least, this is what the adverts seem to promise).
I'm also not sure where the idea of a "trade" fits into modern patterns of employment anyway. In the past you might have had (or expect to have had) a single job (or career type) for a lot longer. Now people seem to shift from job to job (and even from field to field) much more quickly. Where we will have skilled careers there's either existing protocols/institutions (medicene and law I guess) or are relying on some sort of hobbyist "life time training" as with IT.
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Originally Posted by Yahwe
then maybe you should get out more
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Perhaps. I suspect when I'm out I'm just not moving in the right circles though.
I was told English was a girly subject!