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Businesses, local government and schools need to do more to attract students to skilled trades聽鈥� and work harder to keep them in those jobs, a coalition of major manufacturers led by the Ford Motor Co. reported last week.

The rise of robotics and artificial intelligence isn鈥檛 lessening the need for skilled workers, industry leaders said as they called for better training; it鈥檚 just requiring workers to use technology as a tool. 

The Alliance for America鈥檚 Skilled Trades, which also includes Google, Carhartt and Black & Decker, estimated last week the nation needs about 1.7 million additional workers each year in skilled trades; ranging from plumbing to manufacturing to construction.

But officials said there aren鈥檛 enough training programs or enough candidates  finishing the programs  to keep up.

The report, found a 鈥渟ubstantial mismatch,鈥� with formal training through schools or registered apprenticeships filling only 55% of the need. 

The greatest shortfalls are for mechanics for industrial machinery and electricians, with carpenters, plumbers and HVAC repair and installation not far behind, according to the report. 

Ford President and CEO Jim Farley said young people have been told for too long that going to college, not learning a trade, was the only way to succeed.

鈥淭oday we are paying that price,鈥� Farley told business leaders gathered by Ford in Detroit last week for a summit on what he called the 鈥渆ssential economy.鈥�

鈥淥ur mission is straightforward,鈥� Farley added at the forum at the restored Michigan Central Station, a former railway hub turned into a training and innovation center. 鈥淕et the data to deeply understand the problem. Get busy training more people with the skills our country needs.鈥�

Ruth Porat, president and chief investment officer of Google and Alphabet, said students need to hear about career opportunities the trades offer, not just about college, from their parents and high school guidance counselors.

Though 95% of school counselors agree trade school is valuable, just 56% recommend vocational or trade school to students, according to a survey the Ad Council Research Institute conducted for Ford earlier this year. Only 28% said they recommend apprenticeships to students often.

鈥淭his is rewarding and something that the country respects and desperately needs and wants to invest in,鈥� Porat said.

The report researched by the Burning Glass Institute and the Jobs For the Future career training nonprofit.and experts at the forum said that the need for skills and training gaps varies so much by state and city that it鈥檚 hard to have clear national recommendations for solving the shortage.

Ohio and Rhode Island need industrial machinery mechanics more than any other trade workers, the report found, while that skill is just a middle-of-the pack need in Kentucky. Rhode Island also has a great need for many more plumbers, pipefitters, and steamfitters. 

The overall need is growing in some states, while declining in others. Arizona employers, for example, added 73,000 trades jobs since 2019, while New York lost 40,000.

Some states are training people so well that many are leaving for states that need workers but fall well short in training them. Texas and North Carolina, for example, import 5,000 more skilled trades workers from other states than they send, while New York sends out roughly 9,000 more than it takes in.

While Wisconsin, Oklahoma and Kentucky are training workers well, Arizona, Colorado and Florida are lagging far behind demand, Burning Glass Institute President Matt Sigelman told reporters. 

鈥淎 lot of the places that are growing the most, that need the most new workers, that are鈥� having to do the most to pull workers in, aren’t necessarily pulling people up from within,鈥� Sigelman said. 鈥淭hese fast-growing states are essentially importing the workers that they’re failing to train.鈥�

The challenge is deeper than just convincing people to try trades, the alliance found in the report Trades have a 鈥渓eaky pipeline鈥� of new workers, with only 55 percent of people who start training finishing it, sometimes because they aren鈥檛 paid at all during training or they need other help.

鈥淢aybe they don’t have the wraparound services they need,鈥� Farley told the gathering. 鈥淚t may be childcare. It may be transportation. And if they don’t have that stuff, they can’t get the training.鈥�

鈥淲e have clear obstacles we have to face beyond just the program itself,鈥� he added.

Apprenticeships, in which students take classes for a trade while being paid to work, might be the best way to solve those issues, he said, though the alliance does not have clear recommendations for how to make them more available. Those are rare for high school students, and while they are more common for graduates, they are nowhere near as available as in other countries.

The call for more training mirrors findings of other surveys, including one earlier this year by the University of Chicago and commissioned by Harbor Freight Tools for Schools. That survey found 95% of voters and 81% of parents of high school students believe more opportunities to study skilled trades in high school would better prepare students for careers.

About 84% of voters and 73% of parents support increased government funding for trades, that survey found.

Though not a focus of the report, the rise of artificial intelligence and robots was a backdrop to the summit in Detroit. Farley told reporters that Ford is doing more to automate its production lines, so it may not need as many people doing repetitive tasks, but still needs people with the skill to run the lines, program the robots and fix and maintain machines.

鈥淭here used to be a pretty visible line between our engineers and then the manufacturing engineers and then the actual hourly workforce, the skilled trades,鈥� Farley told reporters. 鈥淭hat line is completely blurred now.鈥�

He predicted that tradespeople will learn to use AI as part of their jobs, but won鈥檛 be eliminated by it.

鈥淢ost of these jobs will be both using AI and also protected from it,鈥� Farley said. 鈥淚 don’t think these are the kind of jobs, like, if you work in finance doing spreadsheets, or you’re in a call center, or you’re an entry level programmer. You know those jobs are definitely going to be changed and eliminated by鈥�AI.  I think these (skilled trades) jobs are pretty dependent on it and also pretty isolated from the risks.鈥�

Chris Nelson, president and CEO of Stanley Black & Decker agreed AI will be part of the solution to workforce needs, but won鈥檛 wipe out the need for skilled people. He said a recent survey by his company found almost 90% of construction trades workers expect to use AI in several ways, including planning how to lay out job sites and deciding which materials they need for a job, 

鈥淭hey think it’s absolutely necessary for them to learn AI as a part of their trade training,鈥� Nelson said.

He said AI can be used as a companion to workers, not a replacement.

鈥淭he task is not going to change,鈥� Nelson said. 鈥淗ow swiftly, safely, and productively you can accomplish it in concert with AI is going to be, I think, a big part of the formula.鈥�

That skilled trades have a lack of available workers is no surprise. Researchers and economists have predicted a shortage of workers for years as Baby Boomers, who have dominated industries for years, retire. The college-for-all mindset of the last few decades has also turned parents and students away from trades.

The alliance鈥檚 report released last week found that 24% of skilled trades workers are 55 or older but younger workers are not entering trades to eventually replace them. Only 11% are under 25.

U.S. Secretary of Education Linda McMahon joined the call for better training by telling the gathering that the nation will have a shortage of 2.1 million workers overall by 2030 if career preparation doesn鈥檛 improve.

She was joined by a representative of the U.S. Department of War, who also stressed the need for a strong industrial base to supply the military.

鈥淏y 2030鈥�the five men that are retiring or leaving the workforce today are only being replaced by two,鈥� McMahon said. 鈥淭he economic impact has been estimated鈥�as high as a trillion dollars, so it is vital and critical that we continue this work.鈥�

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