When Did Factory Jobs/Manufacturing Become Sexy Again?

Back as recently as the 1980s, factory jobs and manufacturing were often derided as "dead end factory jobs" and were fates to be avoided or overcome.

Look at early 1980s movies like "All the Right Moves", "Flashdance", and "An Officer and a Gentleman", the jobs that people were trying to move past in those were respectively "steel mill, steel mill, textile mill" in that order.

Now everyone seems to want to "bring back manufacturing".

When did this all change?

Probably around 2008 when lots of people lost their jobs and had trouble finding anything that would pay them enough to live on.

When the crappy jobs all got automated. Manufacturing is no longer an unskilled profession.

When after 40 years of Faith Based Trickle Down 'Economics' have led to wage stagnation and historically low economic mobility. What used to be a dead end is now a lifeline.

Factory jobs were a stepping stone from teenager jobs to career jobs. If one had to stop at the factory they could make a living for their family and there was advancement into management positions in the factory. These were one of the few entry level positions where your company could see your work ethic and your potential. My father got boosted from the factory floor at general motors into a computer career. It happened because he was able to learn and understand the mainframe operations. My first real job was plopping memory and modules into routers. I moved from there into the company's it department in less than a year because shit just clicked with me and it was visible to management.

Those are not the only jobs where you can do that sort of thing, but they were a great entry level area anyone could start at when they were there. The employment track on flipping burgers or retail is really a dead end because the corporate system doesn't hire from that pool.

When Mike Rowe began highlighting their need.

Gung Ho with Michael Keaton. Great fuckin movie.

It wasn't just tea partiers and the Trump campaign that ramped up the desire for manufacturing jobs.

Remember the President Obama reelection slogan in 2012 "General Motors is alive and Bin Laden's dead!"?

I don't remember that.

Back in the good ol days you could graduate high school and get a job at the local ford plant.
Your wife could stay at home and raise your two kids. You had a car and a house. Because of manufacturing jobs. Obviously.

So people want those magic jobs back where you can do all that shit. But that's just stupid.

I don't know. Maybe because movies are make believe? Factory jobs used to be jobs that someone could raise a family on without having gone to college.

I graduated high school nearly 13 years ago, and back then, NO ONE was discussing anything to my class besides 4 year college, with maybe military as an option for poor kids. In my specific county, the only factory is may be the Budweiser off of Business I-80. But the snobbery against labor jobs like construction and plumbing was drilled into the AP kids at least well before senior year.

I kinda wonder how much street cred plumbing got from Nintendo...

They never did. But those jobs, which have been dead and buried for decades, are the only hope of the uneducated. As with pretty much everything Trump (and every other populist in the world) plays on a 'better' past. He fails to mention that the 50s won't ever come back.

The uneducated are eating up a dead dream. In the 70s, a menial job could support a whole family. But this will never, ever happen again. But the uneducated wouldn't be uneducated if they could grasp that reality. They'll rather believe the sweet sweet lies and blame immigrants. As usual, scapegoats make their own lives a little better.

Mind you, in the US at least, there's still demand for some things like plumbing and electricians. You'd have to squint to find apprentiship programs but they do exist. That's probably a far better bet than college these days....worst case scenario, you hate the job but you can have a skill to help you work though school and get out with little to no debt.

Apprenticeship is a crucial part of the education system here. It's important that even if a young person chooses it (usually at age 15), there is still a way to higher education. And there is, always. There's also a lot of money to be made if you're good in your craft. There is no such thing as a good electrician who ever has time. Very very high demand.

Doesn't change the fact that uneducation is a HUGE problem here too. Doesn't come from having no chance for an education, comes from refusing to take any of the the gazillion mostly free chances.

I'm not sure where the "derided in the 8os" part comes in?

In 1988 I was making $15/hr feeding a machine while learning how to maintain it on the side. If that job had ended, there were 30 other places on the same street I could've walked into for comparable wages. Factory work then didn't pay minimum wage nor did it rely on temporary employment pimps.

My personal opinion (only) is that education, particularly the four year college degree has been way oversold as the way to get a relatively easy high paying job. As recently as the mid 1980s when I entered college people were touting a Bachelor's degree as a short cut to getting a 50,000 a year job.

Well, in the 80s, there also weren't nearly as many people with degrees as there are now. It may have been good advice back then, but it isn't now.

I shoulda been an electrician.

When I graduated from highschool, the OPEC Crisis was just beginning to bite both the economy and my plans to save for university. So I built railway cars for six months, then a bunch of us last-hired were laid off. Next, dishwashers for about the same period. Same thing happened. Then grave-digging for minimum wage (in some respects the best job I ever had). Tiring of this bullshit, I emigrated (though I didn't realize that's what I was doing).

You didn't need particular skills. In an industrial town like Hamilton you could work practically anywhere, if you were lucky enough to get the job.

My grandfather was a carpenter in Hamilton. He owned his own house and supported a family. But one must remember that there wasn't the Full-Channel Consumerism in them days that there is now. There were far fewer things you could possibly spend your income on.

I agree with a lot of these posts. One reason the 50s, 60s and 70s (the French call them the Glorious 30) were so glorious was the widely embraced New Deal (every country with its own version). Another was strong unions. It took a dogged struggle to make them strong, but once they were, you were earning a true living wage.

In particular, I agree with several on this thread who've pointed out that it ain't comin' back if only because of automation. Donald fails to mention that the Mexicans or Chinese who took those exported jobs don't have them anymore because robots is doin' 'em.

The best advice is be goddamn good at what you do. Show passion and interest. Specialize, learn, succeed.

A degree alone means nothing. I have one, university. Didn't work in the field for even an day so it's meaningless (comes in handy though in terms of holistic analysis of... things). As long as you're doing just some job you'll stay a drone at best.

I can beat that: Be Lucky!

Luck can be helped.

No doubt. But I'm not ashamed to say I was extremely lucky professionally. (My genius helped, naturally...)
It really pisses me off the way people neglect to mention luck when things turn out well.

What about those of us who aren't particularly good at anything?

I don't know if I'd call them sexy, but due to programs like This Old House, Rehab Addict and others, the option of not needing four years or more of higher education to get a decent job. Plus, 2-year programs such as ITT managed to give training and usually get the student a job right after graduation.
As far as I'm concerned, the worst thing that happened to students in education was to get rid of vocational training.

When did manufacturing become sexy again? I don't think it did. Try wooing a woman in urban or suburban America, or anywhere, by telling her you work at a factory.

I'd think how you reveal it matters.
"I make cars," is better than "I work at the car factory."