[TADSLOS]

Lots of great skill job opportunities out there. Skip snowflake saturated academia that trains you to hate success. Go learn a hard skill and earn real money.

[equaviator]

We don’t have much of a machine tool industry here and haven’t since the early 1980s. Without it, we probably could never be the “Arsenal of Democracy” again, even if we had to.

[glasseye]

I live in Silicon Valley.
A journeyman CNC machinist can pull 120K easily here.
I self learned machining 25 years ago and know G code for easy stuff, sell some motorbike parts online made on a friends mill.
My home shop is an Ecello mill and a vintage South Bend 10K heavy lathe.
Talked my millennial nephew into taking CNC classes, there is a future in it.

[P8riot]

I am an engineer, and work with highly skilled trades people every day. They continue to humble me every day with their level of knowledge. I can design stuff, but it is the trades that actually build them and make them work, (many times helping me redesign them so they will). We really don't have enough of them. Too many people have bought the line that they have to go to college, but after they graduate, can't find a job, and all they have to show for it is a piece of paper and tens, if not hundreds, of thousands of dollars of school debt that they (or their parents) have to repay.

My wife was a journeyman electrician when I married her 25 years ago, and I have two nephews who are journeyman machinists. My nephews are both in their 20s and are making in excess of $50K a year each. If they had gone to college like their mother (my sister) wanted them to, they would probably be like most of the other college grads whose future is uncertain.

[Tucker39]

This is just one of the various types of things Mike Rowe (DIRTY JOBS) is trying to get high school kids interested in. I think he even has scholarships and apprenticeship leads for youths of all colors and stripes. Plumbing, electrician, HVAC, machining, etc. GOOD PAYING jobs, begging for somebody to come and DO them.

[Ace's Dad]

My Grandpa Stewart was a machinist at the Grand Blanc, Michigan tank plant through the Korean War; I got to watch him work during a plant tour (my dad, a former tool & die foreman, knew where he worked). It was cool to see your grandpa doing something technical! I was and am, so proud of him after that visit!

I think if more kids got to see, up close, what skilled trades operators actually do, they would become interested in "vocational" (what a "weasel" word) education.

[Yardstick]

Finding a good machinist is like finding gold. We are constantly designing new things.

[bobrlbob]

You will always find a job.

[trebb]

Spent a couple years as a machinist before enlisting - really enjoyed it and it helped hone my “work with your hands” that Dad had engendered in me. Came in handy as hell a few times.....

[mad_as_he$$]

Good article. The need is yuge and it is a great career.
The average salary seems low to me. Machinists in my area are paid about $5-7k more per year. If you can optimize G code you can make significantly more money.

I recently toured a facility that makes AR parts. They have optimized the process(s). An AR lower comes off the CNC machining center basically complete and at a shocking rate.