Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) should be celebrating the AI revolution, not trying to shut it down. After all, AI may cause some employment upheaval, but it is already encouraging the growth of middle-class jobs. It could even lead to the rebuilding of unions.
As the progressive senator from Vermont rails against data centers and warns of a job apocalypse, in addition to yelling about tech billionaires and other pet peeves, he overlooks that AI is causing a boom in blue-collar work. Many workers now being hired in one of the great building sprees of all time will join unions — the kind that fund Bernie’s politics.
Meta highlighted that reality this week by announcing that it is forming America’s Workforce Academy, a $115 million training program meant to develop a new generation of welders, plumbers, electricians and other trades workers needed to build out AI facilities.
Not only will Meta’s school train people for free in fields key to the new technology’s infrastructure, it will also guarantee them jobs upon graduation. The company will provide students with transportation and pay for their certification in their new fields. It doesn’t get much better than that.
Meta is not a selfless enterprise, of course; the social media powerhouse is providing this opportunity because it sees a critical shortage of such workers available in the U.S. It and others in the industry are investing hundreds of billions of dollars on AI-related facilities including data centers, an unparalleled build-out that will not be completed without people who know how to wire, weld and construct such projects.
Meta’s start-up will begin with pilot programs in Louisiana, Ohio, Texas and Indiana. In the first year, they expect to graduate thousands of students. The firm is partnering with a nonprofit run by Mike Rowe, who has for years advocated for training more workers in the trades.
Meta and Rowe are not the only folks who see a need to bolster our workforce in the specialized trades. The U.S. Department of Education estimates that by 2030, some 2.1 million skilled trades jobs in the U.S. could go unfilled, with the resulting potential economic loss rising to as much as $1 trillion annually. The department cites a drop in workforce participation as partly responsible for the shortage, as well as “barriers to reentry due to credential opacity, benefits cliffs, or misalignment between education and employer needs.”
There is also an impending worker shortage, as Fortune Magazine reports, resulting from the likely retirement of millions of skilled hands. Over 20 percent of U.S. construction workers are over 55 years old, the Associated Builders and Contractors reports, with nearly 40 percent of electricians older than 45. Meanwhile, in the fields of “manufacturing, construction, and other skilled trades,” five experienced workers are retiring for every two new workers entering the workforce to replace them.
A study from commercial real estate giant JLL shows that builders posted almost 600,000 job openings last year for major skilled trades positions in the U.S.; the roughly 150,000 who made it through various apprenticeship programs did not come close to satisfying that demand. The same study projects that jobs for electricians are projected to increase by 9.5 percent through 2034, or more than three times the 3.1 percent average for all occupations, while demand for HVAC technicians is expected to grow 8.1 percent over the same period.
Meta is not the only firm trying to ease the worker shortage. Last year, Google announced a $10 million initiative to support the training of electricians through the Electrical Training Alliance, with a goal of developing 100,000 new electricians and 30,000 apprentices. And earlier this year, Microsoft announced a partnership with the North America’s Building Trades Unions (Bernie should be cheering) aimed at strengthening apprenticeships and training programs in skilled trades and also making workers AI-literate in areas where data centers are being built.
Why do we have such a critical shortage?
First, because America’s politicians and educational establishment have for decades pushed kids onto the college track, with the government providing billions in loans for those seeking a post-high school education. Trades were stigmatized; high schools that used to turn out kids ready to go to work as auto mechanics or plumbers gave up those “shop” classes as educators deemed them discriminatory. As Mike Rowe says on his website: “Too many people have been told the only path to success runs through a four-year degree.”
Second, because there has been too little effort to show kids growing up in urban centers how they can access a middle-class life through learning a trade. Many don’t even know such opportunities exist.
Third, because nonprofits aiming to help kids achieve the American dream have prioritized woke “racial justice” or climate programs over making kids self-sufficient.
Thankfully, that is changing. Bloomberg Philanthropies in recent days announced what it describes as a $90 million “first of its kind” National Skilled Trades Initiative, which will train high school students to acquire “Registered Apprenticeships and high-wage, family-sustaining careers in the skilled trades.” Almost certainly others will follow.
Not only could the country’s economic growth be stymied by a shortage of key workers, young people who borrow hundreds of thousands for a degree enabling their ambition to become an accountant or lawyer may find themselves competing with AI and struggling to find a job. Skilled workers will not face that challenge.
The Process Excellence Network, a consultancy, writes in a recent study: “Skilled trades are having a genuine renaissance. Electricians, plumbers, HVAC techs, and similar roles combine fine motor skills, problem-solving in unpredictable settings, and real client interaction. Dynamic, messy environments — homes, construction sites, outdoors — defeat rigid automation.” In other words, this is where people still beat out AI.
Since skilled trades often pay as well as the white-collar jobs now being lost, kids will gradually pivot to this new reality. Let’s hope Bernie does as well.
Read Liz Peek’s full column on The Hill here.
