whitecollar

At just 23, Jacob Palmer is already running his own electrical company. He launched the business in 2024 after starting in the field as an apprentice electrician, a career path he embarked on when college turned out not to be for him.

Palmer has no regrets about his decision to forego college and instead establish himself as a tradesman. “I am very happy doing what I am doing now because it has given me the opportunity to work for myself and be independent,” he told CBS News.

Experts say the skilled trades — jobs like electricians, plumbers, welders, masons, HVAC technicians and other occupations requiring extensive training and often licensing — are attracting a growing number of young people put off by high tuition costs. 

More than 57% of Gen Zers surveyed by Jobber, a software tool for service businesses, cite student loan debt as a concern about going to college, according to the company’s annual report on attitudes toward blue-collar jobs. 

More recently, signs that artificial intelligence is starting to gobble up the kind of entry-level jobs that once went to young college graduates are also leading young workers to consider the trades. Some 77% of Gen Zers say it’s important that their future job is hard to automate, with many pointing to professions like carpenter, plumber, and electrician as occupations they believe are safe from automation. By contrast, they see less security in fields like software development, data analytics, and accounting, according to the survey.

“That route is losing some of the stigma,” said David Asay, president of Advantage Reline, a trenchless pipe rehabilitation company in Mesa, Arizona. “The perception among that younger group is no longer, ‘Oh, you’re working construction, you didn’t go to school?’ It’s, ‘What a cool skillset. You’re making a good career path.'”

Harder path for college grads

For decades, many young people shunned the trades, with everyone from economists and career experts to politicians and parents emphasizing the importance of obtaining a college diploma. That conventional wisdom isn’t entirely wrong — it’s just behind the times. 

 “The attitude was that jobs in the trades were less than desirable,” said Angie Hicks, co-founder of Angi, an online home improvement services guide told CBS News.

But several factors are contributing to a shift in how people are thinking about such occupations. For one, going to college for many Americans often requires going into debt. The average cost of college, including tuition and room and board, now tops $38,000 a year and is approaching $60,000 for private institutions, according to the Education Data Initiative. 

Factoring in the added burden of interest on student loans and potential income one foregoes while in school, the total cost of earning a bachelor’s degree can exceed $500,000, the research firm has found. 

More recently, economists also point to a jump in unemployment for recent college grads, which some experts say is an early warning sign that AI is taking jobs away from less experienced workers. The jobless rate for 23-to-27-year-old college grads this year now hovers around 4.6%, up from 3.2% for the same demographic in 2019. 

Strikingly, non-college-educated workers in the same age range have experienced a much smaller uptick in unemployment, at roughly 0.5%, over the same period, according to an analysis from the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis. 

“AI can’t go out in the field”

Vinnie Curcie, founder and CEO of OC Solar, a solar installation company in Irvine, California, said the solar energy field differs from other trades in that the work requires time both in the office and in the field. OC Solar offers three main services — solar panel and battery sales, project management and installation services. But he expects AI will soon handle much of the sales and project management sides of the business. 

While prospective employees once tended to have stronger interest in the company’s marketing, management or other white-collar roles, more job candidates today are eager for roles in the field.

“More people are interested in the field because they know that’s where the job security is,” Curcie told CBS News. 

Some school districts also report seeing growing student interest in blue-collar careers. Marlo Loria, director of career and technical education and innovative partnerships at Mesa Public Schools in Mesa, Arizona, said more of her students are enrolling in schools’ welding, construction and auto shop programs than there is space for.

Asay, of Advantage Reline, added that students with an entrepreneurial bent can also be well-suited for the skilled trades.

“They can take their skills and create their own business, or become a bigger part of our business, outside of being someone with a shovel in a trench,” he said.

Palmer said his business generated $90,000 in revenue in its first year and is on track to top $150,000 in 2025, a more than 30% increase — no college degree needed. The other upside to life as an electrician, as he sees it, is the job security. 

“I don’t feel overly threatened by the growth of AI in my industry. That will be a pretty impressive robot that can do my job one day, if it ever happens,” Palmer said. 

Kayden Evans, an 18-year-old senior at Mountain View High School in Mesa, Arizona, has his eyes set on a career working with his hands, and to eventually start his own business. Currently an intern at Empire Cat, a company that sells, rents and services heavy equipment and tractors, he plans on going straight from high school into an apprenticeship with the company. 

“I wouldn’t say I am worried about AI because where I want to grow is as a field technician, and even though it helps, I don’t think AI can take that over,” he said. “AI can’t go out in the field and take apart an engine.”