[wombat_trouble]

I mean, it's a reasonable career choice.

Practical downsides: considerably lower pay right now compared to a job at FAANG, although certainly nothing to sneeze at. A profession regulated far more than necessary, similarly to many other blue collar fields - for example in California, you need 8,000 hours of apprenticeship to get a license. You are also technically required to deal with municipal bureaucracies and get sign-offs on almost every single thing you do, although most electricians follow these rules rather liberally, and there's a ton of unpermitted work in every older house.

You're less vulnerable to AI, but you sure are vulnerable to downturns in construction.

You serve at the pleasure of your clients. You're gonna be getting emergency calls at weird hours and you're gonna be spending a lot of time in your car.

It's physical labor - you're gonna be spending some time in crawl spaces or other uncomfortable positions, it's rough on your hands, etc.

[germinalphrase]

“ considerably lower pay right now compared to a job at FAANG”

Almost all jobs everywhere pay considerably less than FAANG.

I find it curious that HN so casually uses FAANG pay as the benchmark.

[vidanay]

> I find it curious that HN so casually uses FAANG pay as the benchmark.

And even more mysteriously, treat working at FAANG as a de-facto career goal.

[rchaud]

Being on HN often reminds of the late '00s when I was on a message board called Wall Street Oasis, for undergrads who wanted to go into investing banking or private equity.

On that board, it was honestly seen a failure if a person did not get into one of the Big 4 IBs or PE funds. It was like entering a twilight zone, no one could lower themselves into accepting anything less than working at one of 6 companies on the entire earth.

[kristjansson]

Because they want to own one (1) house in California?

[vidanay]

But then that assumes living in California as a de-facto life goal.

[gjsman-1000]

> but you sure are vulnerable to downturns in construction

This is also a really weird point. If you work at FAANG, you are vulnerable to economic downturns. Just look at how so many tech companies have decimated their workforce.

[pdmccormick]

Kudos to you for the correct use of "decimate".

[ifyoubuildit]

If you lost your FAANG job recently, you have huge prior earnings behind you and can probably slide directly into a non FAANG job that will pay more than most jobs doing electrical work.

This is just not the case if you're an electrician and construction is drying up.

[wiseowise]

Majority kept their job, what’s your point?

[grumple]

It just doesn't make sense as a career because of the regulation. You can become a software engineer, get paid more, with less strain on your body, in far less time without any hours or licensing requirements. I have several books on electricity and electrical work, have an interest in it, but why would I ever take the pay downgrade or recommend this path to someone else?

The trades are going to have to start paying more and reducing regulation.