I know nothing about the industry, but out of curiosity... what are considered the more interesting jobs?

I only know a bit more than nothing, but I'd wager anything industrial is considered more interesting. Single-family residential wiring, especially for new construction where there's nothing in the way, is so simple that even I, using just what I've learned being a homeowner, could meet code with it.

Industrial.

Yeah, industrial/institutional, high voltage, multi-phase, transformers, utility-level stuff e.g. generation and transmission, etc.

Industrial automation as well.

24V / 4-20mA isn't really the same job though.

Talk to contractors in any city with a hardware startup scene and they absolutely are making a killing. Lots of 220V, 480V, miles of 120V. Transformers, machine hookups. You name it.

220, 221, 222… whatever it takes!

208 and 277 as well!

Higher voltage = Higher wages

And a perk, in casse of on-the job death, free cremation service included!

commercial sites are supposed to be good; I know a commercial electrician and he'd talk about the many tech company headquarters and new buildings he and his team would wire up and do all the equipment for. This includes outlets, infrastructure like AC and any special equipment like fire alarms smoke detectors, any everything in between. He'd say working for government jobs were too slow, they took forever to complete, it was always more lucrative to go for private industry large construction sites like new malls, big buildings with large square feet footprints. Basically commercial real estate stuff.

Commercial....wayyyyy different. Need to know a lot more. Employment sucks. I knew HVAC people and flooring people who had it made but they worked for themselves.

Industry and commercial construction got mentioned. But also, the film industry can be an interesting one. Really crazy voltages over there too.

Lineman, controls, fire alarm, even commercial is probably better then stapling romex and ruining joists.

A guy I went to high school with was dangled from a crane to do stuff with a new turbine in a power plant. Sounded pretty crazy.

That's where all the jobs have been in the last five years in his area. His teams are also doing commercial wiring as well, but new builds dominate the work. And they are supposed to complete jobs fast - even if the work is simple doing it fast is not easy.

And so what? "You can succeed if you go into trades... but make sure you don't end up in some of these widespread roles" is a very different narrative than what is usually presented.

CS obviously makes way more but I hear tons of stories of people working overtime or having shitty bosses in developer jobs too, and yet the narrative I hear a lot is get a FAANG job, make 400k then retire by 30

There isn’t any automatic get rich easy scheme. To some extent you have to keep your wits about and make sure you are getting your worth

> "You can succeed if you go into trades... but make sure you don't end up in some of these widespread roles"

Everyone I know in the trades "put in their dues" with at least 10 years of working for someone else, doing the shit jobs, working outside in the rain, in the mud, in the heat, in crawlspaces, in attics, etc.

The smart, driven ones learn all they can, advance, build relationships and reputation, and start their own businesses. The lazy or dumb ones continue to do the crap jobs for their entire career.

Basically, you described that it is pretty bad job. And the only way out is to stop doing that job and start being manager who pressures others to be faster at the bad job. Also, work is pyramid. You have one manager/business owner for many ordinary team members no matter how "smart" all of them are.

And even that, management and business skills are not the same thing as being good tradesman. Just like with programming, you can be smart and driven and not be management material.

The question was whether trades arw good occupation. Not whether you can be better off by stopping being tradesman and going into management.

OK. So what you are saying here is that the trades are a bad job. You spend ten years getting treated like crap and then only succeed if you become a small business owner.

Imagine this for software engineers. "Yeah, SWEs get paid shit and have a bad working environment but some of you will become managers and get paid bank." That wouldn't exactly be a "wow software is an incredible field to be in" situation.

If people want to say "we need more tradespeople - going into the trades will be good for your career" then it better be the case that the actual laborers are getting decent pay.