> America needs carpenters and plumbers. Try telling that to Gen Z Look, as long as we have a market economy, here's how you tell it to Gen Z: raise the wages for carpenters and plumbers (and if necessary shift some of that forward into subsidies and incentives for people to train as carpenters and plumbers) until you get as many as you say you “need”. If America isn’t willing to pay enough to get X carpenters and Y…
There is a psychology problem with skilled trades and younger generates in the US. I've known Gen Z folks who thinks it's better to work at a sandwich shop or small restaurant than skilled trades. They were raised up (through the schooling environment) to look down on trades. Even if it pays them significantly more with better benefits. Many places in the US school system they only prepare people for college. Schools…
People work preferences not being what you'd like may make the cost of motivating them to behave the way you want higher than you would like.
That’s part of how market’s work—you don’t get to choose other people’s utilitt function. If you “need” for them to act in a particular way, that means you need to offer them a sufficient incentive to do so given their actual utility function, not the utility function you wish they were operating under.
> I've known Gen Z folks who thinks it's better to work at a sandwich shop or small restaurant than skilled trades.
Yes, some people’s subjective preferences aren’t yours or those that would be most convenient for your preferred outcomes.
> This is very much a cultural view of skilled trades.
“Cultural view” is just another way of saying “subjective preference”, and, yes, that’s how utility functions work.
Blame whatever you want, Gen Z is mostly a little late for changes to parenting or schooling policies, even if one had a set in mind and the power to wish it into being, to shift this much, so, the bottom line still is, if you want to “tell Gen Z” about your perceived “need” for more tradespeople, you need to do it through sufficient incentives giving their actual values and preferences.