Get Ready to Get Dirty

By MIKE ROWE
Once again, my filthy resume seems to have qualified me to weigh in on a matter for which I have no real expertise but a great deal of enthusiasm.

Despite persistently high unemployment rates, our country now faces a pressing need for more skilled workers. Today, the Senate has invited me to share my theory as to why. I will tell them instead about my grandfather.

Most people knew Carl Knobel as a jack of all trades. I knew him as a magician. For most of his life, my grandfather woke up clean and came home dirty. The stuff he accomplished in between was nothing short of miraculous.

He only made it to the eighth grade, but with hard work and training, my granddad became a plumber, a mechanic, a mason, a carpenter and a Master Electrician. He built the church I went to as a kid, and the farm house my brothers and I grew up in.

To my knowledge, he never once read the directions to anything. He just knew how stuff worked.

I remember one Saturday morning, when I was 12, our toilet exploded in my face. Naturally, my grandfather was called in to investigate. Within the hour we were tearing up the front yard with picks and shovels. There was welding and pipe-fitting, banging and laughing. By sunset we were filthy. A new pipe, however, had been was installed, the dirt was back in the hole — and our toilet was back on its best behavior.

Thirty years later, my toilet blew up again. This time, I called Roto-Rooter; left a check on the kitchen counter, and went away for a few days. When I got home, the problem was solved. But, of course, I never met the guy who did the work. I never even thought to.

Somewhere, during those 30 years I had become less interested in how things were made, and more interested in how things were purchased. So, after a long visit one weekend with my grandfather, I decided to do a TV show in his honor — and “Dirty Jobs” was born.

Right now, our manufacturing sector is weak. Our infrastructure is crumbling. And yet, even with record high unemployment, we have 200,000 manufacturing jobs and more than 450,000 trade, transportation and utilities jobs left vacant.

Why then, are these opportunities seen by so many as some sort of vocational consolation prize? The fact is, we aren’t we encouraging our kids to take the time to learn a skill and master a trade.

Today, my granddad’s skills would be described as “shovel ready,” his critical knowledge a product of “alternative education.” Somewhere in our economy’s transformation from manufacturing to financial services, we have forgotten the most critical part of our workforce. We have become disconnected from the people who keep the lights on. We just leave the check for them on the kitchen counter.

Last year, President Barack Obama announced the “Skills for America’s Future” initiative — helping connect businesses to community colleges, to give students the right training and skills to get and keep a job when they graduate. It enables employers to recruit qualified workers, and gives students the skills necessary to succeed in the 21st century.

This program is a good start. But we need to do more. We need to engage the entire country in a larger conversation about the value of skilled work.

This is about much more than “creating” jobs. This is about the consequences of not closing the skills gap.

As the host of a TV show about hard work, people often assume I speak for tradesmen and skilled workers. I don’t. I can only speak for myself — and anyone else who shares my addiction to paved roads, reliable bridges, heating, air conditioning and indoor plumbing.

The tradesmen I know don’t need a spokesman. It’s the rest of us who need to worry. Because a few years from now, an hour with a good plumber will cost more than an hour with a good psychiatrist. At which point many of us will probably be in dire need of both.

Mike Rowe is the creator and host of the Discovery Channel program, “Dirty Jobs with Mike Rowe.” He is involved with a number of advocacy campaigns involving manufacturing and construction, including I Make America. He is testifying before the Senate Commerce, Science and Transportation Committee on Wednesday.

View original article at Politico here

Read Mike’s oral testimony to the Senate Commerce Committee here.
Watch Mike’s recorded testimony here.
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