Machining vs. Union trades

[3axisrookie]

Hi all, not sure if this is the correct forum for this, but wanted to get some of your opinions on something.

I'm kinda baffled by this. Machining is a very highly skilled trade in my opinion. Hard to even find $18 an hour for someone like myself that went to school, and has minimal work experience. Even looking at ads I rarely see companies offering more than $25 for 5-10 years experience. I'm sure many of you make over $25 (for lead positions and/or massive experience). But what I'm getting at is I know several people with only a high school diploma that jumped straight into a union and are making over $30 an hour right away, and that's on the check. It's over $40 total.

I almost get a sick feeling in my stomach when I think about this.

Anyone else have feelings on this subject? If you are new to the trade, or been in it for a long time, would like to hear from you. I have talked to many older machinists and asked if they could do it all over again, would they. Not one said yes.

Machining is very fun, and very interesting. But starting to think it's a very underpaid trade.

[DJPLAST]

Go watch the news and see all those "UNION WORKERS" from the big three getting laid off. Not many places will hire someone that has been installing lug nuts onto studs at $30-$40 per hr for the last 15-20 yrs. They don't know how to do anything else, the union was their comfort. I have been building injection molds for over 35 yrs now and have always had work. Sometimes better than at other times, but have always had work and been in demand. Get a reputation and be the best that you can be and keep your self known to others and you too can have the comfort of knowing that you will always be able to have work in front of you. After you establish yourself, you can choose what you will and won't do. Then you can command the wages you want.
You will need to be well tooled to stand on your own. A full compliment of personal tools in which you will work out of your own tool box at your work station//machine. Don't be a bother to others by borrowing tools constantly. This will take time to get to that level. But once you arrive you become an asset to the organization.

[duluthboat]

Unions drove wages up from slave labor to a good living wage. They are on the decline and so are wages. There will always be a need for skilled labor, never stop learning new tricks. You are competing with the world now not just your neighbor.
Gary

[ger21]

But what I'm getting at is I know several people with only a high school diploma that jumped straight into a union and are making over $30 an hour right away, and that's on the check. It's over $40 total.

I find that hard to believe. What state do you live in, and what field is paying new guys $30/hour? Some of the higher paying skilled trades require you to serve an apprenticeship before making full scale. An apprentice in the Carpenters union starts at 50% of a journeyman's pay, and I'm pretty sure a journeyman carpenter makes less than $30/hour. http://www.carpenters.org/apprenticeship/

And these days, there's a lot of union guys laid off.

And if you're talking about the UAW, their days are numbered, and those jobs haven't been available for over 10-15 years, unless you had connections to get you in the door. And I live in Detroit.

[3axisrookie]

http://www.westcentralbtc.org/peoria%20wage%20rates.htm

If you know the right people, you can completely bypass the apprenticeship and/or if you have a little experience, they can start you at 70 or 80%.

And definitely wasn't talking about some guy screwing on lugnuts. Electricians, carpenters, pipefitters, plumbers, etc. They will be able to take their skills elsewhere.

I didn't mean to turn this into a union discussion. It's just that I bump into union people all the time and to hear what they make is insane. Not saying they don't deserve it, they have to work in the elements for one. Its just that when I got into machining, I thought I would be happy with the pay by the time I finished school and worked a bit, and it's completely the opposite.

I can say I make 55k a year. Some will say that's great!! You make more than people with 4 year degrees. No, I make $16 an hour and work a lot of hours. So how do I make more money? I can't. If I go for a new job, they see I am young, and make $16 an hour at my current job so that's what they will offer. This one guy even offered me $13. Yeah man, I'm gonna quit my job for $3 less (this guy should be the icon of shop owners I have seen). My current job won't give me a raise because I just got one. If I quit, now I'm making $0 and a new job will offer me even less. And the way I see it, I will be fighting for a higher wage my whole life.

What I really wanted to hear is if you guys are happy with what you make in machining?


Thanks to all that replied.

[dertsap]

[url]

I can say I make 55k a year. Some will say that's great!! You make more than people with 4 year degrees. No, I make $16 an hour and work a lot of hours. So how do I make more money? I can't. If I go for a new job, they see I am young,
Thanks to all that replied.

how young are you and what is your experience and inexperience , this is the driving factor in wage decisions , this is a trade where high wages are earned and it's the experience that will dictate your worth to any company this may take time ,and it takes a different amount of time for everyone , lots of people will never make it just because of a lack of versatility or intelligence , if you bright then you'll have nothing to worry about

there are some types of jobs which breed mediocrity and many of those jobs are inviting because of the quick to get high wages , benefits and such , but may of the are trade less jobs and will become more of a trap than a benefit in the long run

[automizer]

I can say I make 55k a year. Some will say that's great!! You make more than people with 4 year degrees. No, I make $16 an hour and work a lot of hours. So how do I make more money? I can't. If I go for a new job, they see I am young, and make $16 an hour at my current job so that's what they will offer.

Well maybe I can offer some insite as I have had a hard time with this as well. I am early 20s and at 18 went to buy a 50g truck no one looked at me haveing worked hard from my first job at 12 I know its a struggle for anyone young to be respected at first glance. I now work in machine show makeing a decent wage (there is room for growth ) but I am happy. I have tried the union thing yeah I made $28/h walking in the door but the rules drove me nuts I had no freedom to be the employee I wanted to be.
I had to work 10/h days and go to school for 4 hours after my shifts to get where I am.
Good luck

[mc-motorsports]

Agreed to some point that the unions have an over-rated pay scale and the manufacturing trade is underpaid to a point.

Your not going to make any money standing in front of a machine all day. Basically, your worth what it costs to replace you, which is honestly what I concider a fair wage.

You can spend a lifetime in manufacturing, but if you spend your life deburring parts and pushing green buttons all day, your not going to make much money. Programming and management are the two highest paid, other than that, you kinda move out of manufacturing, might be working in a machine shop, but the plant manager probably doesn't need to know half of what you know about machining, yet he would require a diffrent skill set and or wealth of knowledge.

Basically, if you want to make money in manufactuing, it probably isn't going to be standing in front of the same machine all day and possibly not even on the shop floor where the chips are flying, but that's where the fun is in my opinion.

Remember Boeing? Yeah, they are still around... But I remember before they suffered major lay-offs years ago and major competition before the European union started kicking thier ass, they were paying their machinsts around $35-40/HR. Those guys would make double time and a half on Sundays and it was a joke to them, they would get paid $100 to take a sh!t... It was like a game they would brag about, they would goto the bathroom on sunday, sit in there reading the news paper for an hour and get paid $100. Most of them lost thier jobs when Europe started competing with AirBus and such. That's about what the union is good for.

Would I rather be a plumber, electrician or carpenter? NO! When those guys hit 50 years old, some of them look like they are 80 and probably feel like they are dead. Those are labor intensive trades, I have many friends in thier 30's (my age) who have back problems, my best friend broke his archilies tendon a few years back, doctor told him it's common for the construction trades.

Would I have chosen a diffrent carrer path, possibly. A 4 year degree could net you a nice comfy office job where you stay clean and make more then you ever could in a shop floor manufactuing job, but would I be happy? Probably not.

To each his own.

MC

[dertsap]

Would I rather be a plumber, electrician or carpenter? NO! When those guys hit 50 years old, some of them look like they are 80 and probably feel like they are dead. Those are labor intensive trades, I have many friends in thier 30's (my age) who have back problems, my best friend broke his archilies tendon a few years back, doctor told him it's common for the construction trades.


MC

i agree
i used to be a roofer , i made more money than i do now , but it was seasonal and i looked around at the guys i worked with and the other crews and there weren't a lot of guys who were above their forties who didn't have some sort of issue , they've either been badly broken (hurt) a few times or they were alcoholic or drug addicted , not all were but the majority had issues .
i ended up walking into a machine shop and started as a machinist helper at $8/hr , i spent the first few years absolutely broke but eventually the experience came and so did the money , but the beginning was tough

age isn't the factor ,its the experience , but usually when we are young we don't have the necessary experience yet

[chuy]

Machinists used to make a great wage around here in the 90's... but now that everything is being made in frickin CHINA...Shop owners around here usually charge around 60Hr. , so how can a small shop owner to pay top $. The big companies will ,but to them your a number and when things get slow the high paid higher skill guy programmers (like myself) is the first to go...and the operators and just set-up guys tend to stay around. If i were to do it all over again I wouldn't go anywhere near machining. It's totally an under paid under valued trade. I used to be a carpenter.. stumbled into machining in the early 90's during the first Bush recession when I was 22. I got tired of the lay offs from construction. If I were you I'd get out of the trade...and if your want a trade instead of going back to school , than try electrician or HVAC.. you can always work as building maintenace somewhere and make 35 an hr or more. Or shoot go be an RN, 3yrs of school and your making 90 g's a year here in california, for what stickin a thermometer in someones ass?

If your still in your early 20's than my advice to you would be walk away from it ,better yet run and go back to school.
Unless there is a major policy shift in this country in regards to free trade I don't see it getting anybetter.

Don't get me wrong I really enjoy making stuff. It's cool to say I made that! Especially when someone else can't make it and you figured it out, man there is no better feeling, but the uncertainty of the trade and the annual "uh oh" it's getting slow again... the pay now is not worth the stress.

[mc-motorsports]

Gentlemen, we are moving towards a global ecomony. I don't like it, best bet is find your place in it. It's going to be easier for the younger guys who are more flexible, older guys who have been doing things they way that they've been doing them for 30 years will find it difficult but none of us are going to like it.

I don't see things getting back like they were. I blame the Bush's, NAFTA (yes, Clinton originally signed it, Bush signed on China) but the European union is also creaping up on us in the US.

Idle hands are the devils workshop. If we sit back thinking a new presidential administation in the US will bring the US back to where it was, we will be wasting time. We have to look forward and find our place in this new ecomomy.

Global trade will continue to force competition with countries who can pay lower wages. Shop at Wal-Mart and you'll end up working at Wal-mart.

[APP]

Wow. you guys are some bleak ****s.

I think if you are ambitious and stay focused on what the future has, and will bring, you will aspire to any greatness you wish...just as it was in the time of the cave man. Nothing has changed.

Step up. Learn. Grow. Union crutch aint an option any more, and really hasn't been for a long time...it has just finally caught up with Detroit.

The unions were great in their time. But you can not think that the rules of free trade that apply to your boss, do not apply to you.


If you think an unskilled $5.00 a day person can make better parts than you...you have already lost, and should see if Mcburgerwendys is hiring, and hope the REAL men/women out there will still make enough to eat there.


Thank god China keeps lending us money.:biglaughb