To think some people are really snobby about tradespeople?

[Loveheart13]

I’ve noticed that a lot of people really look down on tradespeople/jobs with practical skills.

Dh works in a trade and he earns very well. Obviously I don’t talk about it. I’ve noticed that people make a lot of assumptions that it’s poorly paid, that you must be a bit thick.

I’ve got friends ds and work colleagues who think that university is the only way. I know someone whose nearly adult child is not very academic at all but they are determined to push on as they are certain that anything less than a degree is complete failure.

Why are people so snobby about it?

Because a lot of people think that because they went to university and have a job where they sometimes get to tell other people what to do they are the superior class. And it really grinds their gears when if they want a flushing toilet or their roof not to leak, they're completely dependent on one of the lads from school who left at 16 to come and make that happen. In his own sweet time, and for a sum that exceeds their own day rate.

Some of the cleverest people I know are plumbers, heating engineers and electricians. The skills and knowledge you need to install a boiler, re route the gas etc.

This.

You're many times more likely to end up the director of a successful business in the trades/construction sector. It's truly odd how graduates are held as the gold standard when in reality you might be a gender studies graduate who spends all day doing mindless admin and getting bossed around by a 'very important man'.

I'm a graduate but I'm so glad I escaped project management. I don't care what people think. I made £350 today and had three separate powernaps whilst the piling team were drilling the foundations lol. 😂

no idea why people are snobby towards trades people as a lot of behind the scenes work is also involved ‘using their brain’
provide free quotes…this involves …
petrol to go to the premises involved which costs £££ and at least 30-45 mins measuring up and writing notes
sourcing competitive prices from multiple suppliers / negotiating prices (very time consuming)
drawing up plans to scale (extremely time consuming)
liaising back and forth with customer keeping them in the loop and they usually always change their minds once they know the costs involved causing DH to have to tweak quotes causing the whole above palaver once again …
then at the end the customer can easily just say “no thanks” or if they agree to go ahead with works DH still has to do all the arranging of deliveries / make sure all things coincide as and when needed or go collect materials from numerous suppliers.
It can be a full time job alone just getting all the bits arranged before work even commences…. they then have to invoice customer and wait up to a month (if lucky) to get paid
this lot doesn’t even cover DH having to do their own books/taxes or if lucky pay an extortionate amount to an accountant
People are so blind to what the quote price involves it’s common sense really🤷‍♀️

very narrow minded and totally untrue

Really? What ard the chances.

I feel like it’s only on mumsnet that I see this snobbery. It particularly makes me laugh when I see threads about teenagers career and study choices and someone suggests “just get an apprenticeship” as if this is the easiest option when actually they’re highly sought after and incredibly competitive. My ds is an apprentice electrician, he’s the first in three generations of my family not to go to university.
When I tell friends or colleagues about his career choice everyone says what a good choice he has made and what a valuable profession he’s going into.

A good plasterer is very hard to come by where i live.
My dad has been a carpenter all his life.

Love this 😂

After leaving school with just standard grades, my nephew did an apprenticeship in the building trade. He is now mid 20s and doing far better than my DD or niece who both went down the uni route. His GF is a gas engineer who also earns really well and they will be buying a house later this year.

This is the issue.

The irony. Intelligent people aren't snobby. Snobbery is moronic. Imagine thinking their education shows some kind of superior intelligence. 🤣 Idiots.

Oh there absolutely 100% are pointless jobs.

I don't know what university he attended, but I remember reading an interview with a tradie (plumber, IIRC) who had been an academic. He needed some plumbing work done at home and engaged a tradie to come out. They got into conversation about earnings and neither could believe what the other was making (academic was significantly lower than the plumber).

As a result, he jacked in the lecturing position and retrained as a plumber.

Yep there was a thread the other day where the Ops teen was predicted the lowest grades at GCSE the amount of posters who seemed to think everything would be fine because their husband/ cousin / next door neighbour etc left school 30 years ago without a qualification to their name and are now earning £££,s due to getting an apprenticeship I did keep pointing out that even the basic apprenticeships required a grade four in maths and English

Yes, of course some people look down on tradesmen.

Nowadays tradesmen earnings can rocket above a lot of professionals.

My Dbro a builder, made his first million by 32, opened his own business, 20 years later, he is set for life as are his children.

He does play on his roots to irrate people, he will fly first class in inappropriate clothing, bright, brash,with a tabloid rag under his arm, just to giggle. 🤣

It is changing, just as the working class broke into the professional market, more middle people are choosing trade jobs.

Financially life has evened up for a lot of people.

Yes they can totally earn loads of money. But they’ll never jump social class as perceived by the public.

It can be distressing. And stressful, un ny experience. For many of the reasons outlined in this thread (and none of the reasons in your post).

But the poster wrote, 'if you are able', not many people are able to get into RG universities as to.achihe 3 A/A*s is not that easy.

I think if people think that they are ridiculous but equally there is this attitude that anyone can get into a good university and that just isn't the case.

'The public' largely couldn't care less. Only a small subset of people who's own self worth is tied up with self defining as middle class are invested in gatekeeping the label, and they seem to congregate on MN. Yet even they can't seem to reach a consensus on what criteria is needed to make the 'jump'. There is no way anyone watching someone behave brashly or use a regional accent can know whether they're wealthy, degree educated, a professional or what ever thing is required to be MC, so if they judge people, they are judging behaviour that they associate with being MC. Similarly, they cannot possibly tell if the person in the understated clothes walking quietly round a museum grew up in a council house or not.

My DH who works in an office talks about tradesmen as losers. It makes my blood boil! He would never say this in public but the fact that he thinks that makes me resent him.

Well I don’t think that’s true at all. I think it’s glaringly obvious.

I’m not saying it’s right, just that that’s the way it is.

I don’t personally care to denigrate people. But society certainly does (or at least a sizeable chunk of it). Don’t persecute me for simply stating what happens out there.

Yesterday I had the significant misfortune to share a train with a group of men off to Cheltenham on a corporate jolly. They wore high end suits, got out of expensive cars in a wealthy area. They were shouting, making coarse remarks, clearly drunk by 830. What social class were they?

Yes they can totally earn loads of money. But they’ll never jump social class as perceived by the public.
Nor would he want too, similarly my sister an accountant doesn't want to be perceived as class jumping.
We are very proud to be working class and come from a longline of hardworking people, most of the nieces/nephews are grown, some went to university, others started apprenticeships, thankfully none has picked up on the snobby judgemental attitudes towards WC people, they don't deny their street trader roots or grandparents working the docklands roots.
We all live locally in the city,.
Some areas better than othes.

I think it must depend on your background and where you live.
DH’s Dad is trade and was devastated DH went to college to do A levels then did a degree as part of a management training course. FIL has worked in places where management are the enemy the workers had to get one up on and you can tell he struggles having a son who is a boss.
This is definitely the majority view where we live. Trade means you’re made and university is not for the likes of us.
The majority of pupils in my 14yo year will take vocational GCSE options. There will be no French or Business for his year as the numbers were too low.