Too Old For HVAC?

[Gaboyski]

Haha yes... Start your own company and the labor shortage strikes again. I own my own business and am thinking of getting out of it because no one wants to show up and work anymore.

My only recommendation would be do a trade you can do on your own if necessary. IE you can't carry a 200 pound slab of marble by yourself so counter tops may be a no go. But you can run electrical wires, cut beams etc. Of course everything is easier and more fun with a helper, but the days where you can count on this may be behind us, never to return.

On the bright side I see a positive in all this. The economy may shift to more of a distributist system. More small scale, self employed tradesmen working beyond the red tape. Very exciting possibility to contemplate.

If it were not for the dysfunctional state of the public school system, I would love to advocate for an education reform integrating blue-collar trade training for 16-19 year olds, like what Switzerland is doing, I heard only 25% of Swiss students go to college but they have one of the lowest unemployment rates in the world:



Either that, or some hybrid professional-vocational form of education, say 2 years of community college combined with a year of technical apprenticeship.

You hit two birds with one stone here. Firstly, giving young people more value for their work, and secondly disarming the woke universities from producing corporate drones with useless degrees. On a macro scale, a shift towards distributism would destroy the political power of the globohomo big corporations and the career politician oligarchs that make their money from these corresponding lobbyists. Turning a considerable portion of the working populace into small-scale, self-employed tradesmen (and tradeswomen, for handicrafts like sewing) plus small businesses will discourage mass immigration by filling the demand for skilled labor.

Technician. In HVAC, you would be doing service calls, repairing customers air handling units, furnaces, freezer/coolers etc., depending on the company. Probably installations as well.

Roosh was probably confused by the shortened term, which could also imply something concerning IT or computer science

 

[thedesperado]

I'm thinking about this. What other ways to go through with this besides going through a trade union? My issue is the unions seem to want 5 years commitment, and I currently live in a crazy liberal state that I don't want to keep staying in.

 

[tikkasakko]

The best thing about most Trades are that they are safe from robots stealing jobs.
I worked as an HVAC tech and I can tell you there is no way a robot is going to take a service call at midnight, climb up a sketchy ladder onto a roof in -30 and diagnose a RTU.
That being said I am back to being a machinist where CNC's fill the shop, with only a couple of conventional Lathes and Milling machines around.

 

[Thomas More]

I used to be a service technician installing and repairing a certain class of equipment. I figured that job would always exist. I could go back to that field today if I needed to, by starting my own business.

Even if the current technology is replaced by some futuristic technology involving force fields and anti-gravity, there will always be equipment to be installed and repaired, and there will always be service techs in that field. Even if robots were used to perform the installation, someone would have to setup and operate the robots, so there will always be a role for human techs.

The same is true for a wide range of fields, including HVAC, carpet installation, doors and windows, plumbers, etc. There are also a huge number of specialized industrial fields. I met a guy who specialized in installing and servicing a laser system used in steel refineries to measure the gases escaping from the molten steel, to be able to sense and monitor the chemical nature of the alloy being produced. Of course, this technology might become obsolete, but if you can get into a job installing and servicing a specialized class of equipment, you should be able to have a good paying and secure job.

 

[Pete345]

I heard only 25% of Swiss students go to college

I was on a hike today with an older Swiss gentleman and he told me that only 18% of Swiss youth complete the Abitur, which is the college entrance exam. They have a very high skilled-labor segment of society, and obviously it works for them. American needs to bring this back on a massive scale, give men marketable skilled labor apprenticeships, and get the nation out from under the curse of the college debt scam. Build up trade guilds like we had in Europe throughout the Middle Ages, so men and their families are trained and protected.

 

[MichaelWitcoff]

What is a "tech"?

Yes as tikkasako mentioned it is an HVAC technician. For example I had four home visits or “calls” today, three tune-ups to make sure peoples’ AC is working as the summer begins and one watching a more experienced technician do something notably more complicated. If I notice something broken, missing or not working properly I recommend repairs/cleanings/replacements and if the person wants to do it I do that part as well if I have the tools and parts with me.

Sometimes, as one of our guys learned yesterday, you take off an AC door and find encouraging notes as well:

 

[bubs]

Yes as tikkasako mentioned it is an HVAC technician. For example I had four home visits or “calls” today, three tune-ups to make sure peoples’ AC is working as the summer begins and one watching a more experienced technician do something notably more complicated. If I notice something broken, missing or not working properly I recommend repairs/cleanings/replacements and if the person wants to do it I do that part as well if I have the tools and parts with me.

Sometimes, as one of our guys learned yesterday, you take off an AC door and find encouraging notes as well:

My 19 year old external air compressor was starting to run but not cool the house (ie it wasn’t blowing out the hot air and the air being circulated within the house was warm). Read a lot online and mostly it sounded like it was time to replace it. A good friend who was an experienced HVAC guy looked at my external unit and told me to clean off the coils with a garden house. Been running good as new ever since. Probably saved me $7500 (at least for a while longer).

 

[darknavigator]

I was on a hike today with an older Swiss gentleman and he told me that only 18% of Swiss youth complete the Abitur, which is the college entrance exam. They have a very high skilled-labor segment of society, and obviously it works for them. American needs to bring this back on a massive scale, give men marketable skilled labor apprenticeships, and get the nation out from under the curse of the college debt scam. Build up trade guilds like we had in Europe throughout the Middle Ages, so men and their families are trained and protected.

Germany has the same apprenticeship system. This is one of the reasons that they escaped the worst effects of the global recession in 2008-2010 - they have a highly skilled workforce. The only drawback to the German system is that it's very hard to retrain if you don't like the career field you're in. Americans can thank the US Supreme Court (Griggs v Duke Power Company) for employers using a university degree as a screening tool for hiring employees.