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Now for the dumb question. How much construction is happening in your area of Michigan right now? He may want to consider moving to a more active location around the country.
Location: East of Seattle since 1992, 615' Elevation, Zone 8b - originally from SF Bay Area
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Indeed is showing 256 electrician jobs open in Seattle. Most seem to be Journey level, but some are trainee level. The problem is that the pay being only in the $50-60k range for those would be difficult to live on with our high housing cost.
My son is looking for an apprenticeship job as an electrician. He went to the community college and received his Associates of Science degree for the electrician field. He had an almost perfect 4.0 GPA. He is very sharp. He also worked while going to school. He isn't getting anywhere in the state we live in (Michigan) and so he is looking out of state.
He has no real world experience as an electrician but he is applying for jobs that specifically state no experience is required. Is the job market really as good as they say it is?
It doesn't matter how good or bad the job market is.
If he wants to be an electrician, tell him to keep trying.
This ASSUMES of course your son is like 20-28ish years old and not like ... 40.
And it doesn't matter if he had a 2.2 GPA. Eventually it is very likely someone will give him a chance. There's always an employer willing to take a chance on youth.
May be out of state and it may take a few years, but that's the beauty of being young.
Of course, as I implied, if you're much older, different story.
But, basically the best chance he has is to put all of his time and effort into the search ... in other words, if he could live with you and search FT, that would increase his chances.
If he has to juggle looking for internships with working a hard FT job, and/or taking care of a wife and kids, well ... that decreases the odds.
Electrician jobs really only pay well if you own the company or if you are Union, now getting a spot in
a apprenticship Union may be hard if you do not have a connection, like many jobs it's usually "who you know"
to get your foot in the door, he could get a job for a contractor non union as a helper to start but money will not be
good and you work in hot attics, not great working enviroments ect.
If your son is a good student as you say he should keep going as just having a 4 year degree will open doors
that if you do not have will remain closed, if you can graduate from College you should I beleive as many do
not have the academic ability to and those people go for the blue collar jobs like electricians.
The cynic in me manages to believe the union has a lock on the really good jobs and are purposely keeping the number of qualified electricians low.
It's a personal thing with me, but I'd look where unions have no control. Easy for me to say because unions hardly exist where I live.
AC and heating is closely related to electrical work. Around here, that's where I would look.
The cynic in me manages to believe the union has a lock on the really good jobs and are purposely keeping the number of qualified electricians low.
It's a personal thing with me, but I'd look where unions have no control. Easy for me to say because unions hardly exist where I live.
AC and heating is closely related to electrical work. Around here, that's where I would look.
I was in the IBEW and no it doesn't work that way. You have NECA which is basically the contractors group who negotiates with the IBEW which is the union. It's the unions job to keep NECA happy by providing them quality electricians to choose from. If they don't, then NECA can actually use non union contractors. IBEW trains the electricians through apprenticeships. NECA contractors hire these electricians through the union.
This was my son 5 years ago. We gave up in our home state and helped him move to another.
He will complete his apprenticeship at the end of this year.
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