Penna Dexter

According to Fortune magazine, Ford Motor Company CEO Jim Farley “thinks America needs a wake-up call.” Mr. Farley told Monica Langley, host of Office Hours: Business Edition podcast, his company has 5000 open jobs for mechanics. He said these jobs pay six-figure salaries.

It’s not just Ford that’s having trouble finding people to fill manual labor positions. Mr. Farley said, “We are in trouble in our country…We have over a million openings in critical jobs, emergency services, trucking, factory workers, plumbers, electricians, and tradesmen.”

As we bring manufacturing jobs back to our shores, there’s a gap between available jobs and the number of people willing and able to fill those positions.

Fortune cites Bureau of Labor Statistics data which show that, as of August, there were 400,000 manufacturing job openings. At the same time unemployment was up somewhat, at 4.3 percent. A 2024 survey of 200 manufacturing firms showed half reporting difficulty recruiting and retaining workers as their “top struggle.”

Jim Farley laments the lack of trade schools. He said that one of the reasons people aren’t filling these manufacturing jobs is that they do not possess the basic training needed. He told the podcast audience, “We are not investing in educating a next generation of people like my grandfather who had nothing, who built a middle-class life and a future for his family.”

There’s a mismatch. Recent college graduates are finding their degree is not necessarily the ticket to a job they really want to do.

Wall Street Journal columnist Allysia Finley argues that the real cause of the mismatch is “government subsidization of higher education, which has distorted the labor supply.” We have too many newly minted recipients of bachelor’s degrees entering the labor force and a shrinking number of workers without college degrees or with associate degrees.

Some Gen Zers are skipping traditional college and student loans and taking well-paying manufacturing jobs. Perhaps they’ll bring some balance back into the market.