Stigma of ‘Dirty Fossil Fuels’ Drives Young People Away from Lucrative Careers in Oil and Gas Work

Petroleum Engineers

Petroleum engineering is the highest paying bachelor’s degree in the United States, according to a report by Payscale, but despite an average annual salary of $97,500, oil companies struggle to fill positions.

The industry faces a number of challenges. Employees often face cyclical layoffs whenever commodity prices collapse, and that makes the jobs appear unstable. Young people today are also concerned about working in an industry they’re taught is destroying the planet.

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Commentary: A Mastery of the Skilled Trades Is Essential for a Free People

The Government Accountability Office on Wednesday revealed that Boeing is having trouble finding qualified workers for its nearly $5 billion Air Force One project. Thanks to COVID-related delays and retirements, the project is understaffed and behind schedule. The aviation giant has already lost $1.1 billion on the deal, which was contracted in 2018 at a fixed price of $3.9 billion and may not be finished until mid-2025.

Not just any warmblood with a wrench can walk in and get a job assembling the president’s jet. Due to the top-secret nature of the aircraft – actually, two specially converted 747-8s that the Air Force officially designates as the VC-25B – anyone working on the project needs to undergo an in-depth background check for a security clearance.

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Commentary: ‘Dirty Jobs’ Star Mike Rowe Just Totally Debunked the Argument for a $15 Minimum Wage

Mike Rowe

Mike Rowe knows the value of hard work. The former star of “Dirty Jobs” gained notoriety for the Discovery Channel program, which featured him going undercover at some of the toughest and grossest jobs imaginable. From cleaning bat poop to testing shark suits by jumping into a shark feeding frenzy, Rowe has more appreciation than most for the dignity of labor.

So, it’s worth taking the actor’s recent warning on the perils of minimum wage hikes seriously.

Advocates for a federal $15 minimum wage argue that it’s the bare minimum that workers deserve and that more than doubling the mandated wage nationwide would uplift workers who are struggling to get by. Critics often point out that minimum wage hikes cause unemployment.

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Mike Rowe on Rising College Tuition as Classes Move Online: ‘What Are We Paying For?’

Mike Rowe took a swipe at the rising cost of college tuition during an interview Tuesday with Fox News, asking, “what are we paying for?”

Calling what students are paying to attend college courses “somewhere between egregious and obscene,” the host of “Dirty Jobs” said that he predicts “one of the silver linings” from the coronavirus pandemic will be Americans’ commitments “truly to learning” and that the crisis could “completely redefine” how people learn moving forward.

Rowe told viewers that just the week before, he watched an online lecture from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

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Mike Rowe: We Will Need More Skilled Tradespeople Because of the Coronavirus

American television host Mike Rowe said Tuesday that the effects of the coronavirus emergency could radically alter how Americans perceive the skilled trade industry.

Rowe said this while appearing on Tucker Carlson Tonight.

“I think if you’re looking for a silver lining in all of this, in my own foundation our prime directive over the past 10 years has been to affirmatively confront and debunk the stigmas and stereotypes and myths and misperceptions that dissuade people from pursuing a career in the trades. When we come through the other end of this thing, the need for skilled tradespeople in this country, I believe, is going to be at an all-time high. That is basically good news for the middle class. If we can somehow level the playing field by the way in which we present opportunities to kids, middle class kids in particular, I think we might see real success in not only closing the skills gap but getting people on a path to a six-figure job that doesn’t require a big, giant college debt,” Rowe said.

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More Trade Workers Needed To Close ‘Skills Gap,’ Expert Tells Nashville Homeschool Convention

Tennessee Star

The U.S. is facing a “skills gap” that will only get worse unless more young people develop an interest in trade jobs, experts say. Homeschool guidance counselor Phylicia Masonheimer delivered that message to homeschoolers  and their parents over the weekend at the Teach Them Diligently homeschool convention in Nashville. It was a message very familiar to fans of television host and narrator Mike Rowe. Rowe told Tucker Carlson on Fox News last month that there are 5.6 million job openings in fields that typically do not require a bachelor’s degree. The former Dirty Jobs host said that taking vocation-technical training out of high schools contributed to the skills gap by teaching students that the best path to success is a college degree. “If you really want to make America great again, you gotta make work cool again,” he said. Rowe runs a foundation that provides scholarships and information to get more people interested in trade jobs. The mikeroweWORKS Foundation aims to address “the country’s dysfunctional relationship with work, highlighting the widening skills gap, and challenging the persistent belief that a four-year degree is automatically the best path for the most people,” according to the foundation’s website. Many others are also increasing efforts to highlight the…

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