President Trump has been upending the global economy in the name of bringing manufacturing back. President Joe Biden signed into law massive investments aimed at doing something similar. The American manufacturing sector is reviving after decades of decay.
But there’s something a bit weird undercutting this movement to reshore factory jobs: American manufacturers say they are struggling to fill the jobs they already have.
According to data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics, there are nearly half a million open manufacturing jobs right now.
Last year, the Manufacturing Institute, a non-profit aimed at developing America’s manufacturing workforce, and Deloitte, a consultancy firm, surveyed more than 200 manufacturing companies. More than 65% percent of the firms said recruiting and retaining workers was their number one business challenge.
also very hazardous too. probably also long hours, or the hours are very inconsistent, you may get work 1 week and no work in another week, its not-sustainable. also the tariffs have kinda caused manufactering of products to go down too.
These things really depend on the company. I’ve worked on and off at my family’s sheet metal fabrication company for 16 years. Hazardous? Yes, but there’s usually plenty of protections in place to prevent most injuries. Very very few people actually get hurt and it’s usually because someone did something dumb. I only encountered long hours when I worked at another fab company because they were bad at managing headcount and usually had too much work. For hour inconsistency, I’ve never encountered that except the one time I was laid off. Usually temps help fill in the gap if they’re scared they won’t have enough work long term instead of hiring another person full time and sending people home when work runs out. The hours were sustainable, but working the production floor was low pay. Usually $14 per hour for first shift and $21 per hour for graveyard shift IIRC. This is just my experience with two companies though, so mileage may vary.