Blue Collar Jobs

In the current economic situation in the U.S, graduating high school and going off to college for a degree has pretty much become the goal for most of the students here in the United States. According to the Institute of Education Sciences, studies have shown that between 1999 and 2009, the number of students in the United States perusing a degree in college full time has risen by almost 45% while part time students increased by 28%. With the vast expanding number of students, the number of job openings for these certain fields are simply not enough to provide every graduate with a job. Because of this problem the unemployment rates are staggeringly high here in the United States which includes the 44% those coming out of college. (Rampell) Take Kyle Bishop for example. Currently 24, he has been waiting tables, delivering beer, and working at a bookstore since 2009 when he graduated from the University of Pittsburgh. (Rampell) Stories like this arise every day and only more appear. It will eventually affect future college students pursuing a degree and those who return to study to obtain a degree. Despite these stories however, many companies have been seeking employees to fill up positions for months to years. Many of these jobs have included machinist, welder, and many more in manufacturing, hence blue collar jobs. Now you may be thinking, how can companies not fill up position for manual labor? But with the pace of the advancement of technology in modern society, machinery has become more complicated and requires a higher skill cap to use compared to before while the number of workers with the skill to operate them has been dwindling. In the North Dakota oil fields, there is a 30% shortage of petroleum engineers and a 10% shortage of machinists that the companies simply cannot find enough workers with the skillsets to fill up these positions. According to news article from the Dallas Morning News the workforce is very skilled but they’re mostly people with