The federal government estimates Canada will need 1.4 million new trades workers by 2033 to replace retiring workers and meet project demand.
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Apprenticeship enrolments hit a record high of more than 101,500 in 2024, according to Statistics Canada, but completions of these programs have remained below prepandemic levels. Almost 47,000 apprentices received certification that year, or a rate of 19.9 per cent. In comparison, a decade prior, 93,500 Canadians enrolled in a skilled trade and 59,400 received their certifications.
I was nearly done my 5 years of on-site hours and was on year 2 of my apprenticeship classes before I decided to leave. Financially I was okay because I was renting a room and taking public transit so my monthly bills were extremely low.
I left because the trades were full of some of the worst people to exist who were being lead by some people who managed to be even worse. It’s such a commonly toxic environment no matter the business or country I’ve been in. When covid arrived, everyone became exponentially worse and completely unbearable. The amount of ageism, sexism, racism, ignorance, pettiness and whatever else I’m forgetting to mention was just too much and not worth the unnecessary stress.
Going back to the financial aspect, it’s disgusting that apprentices get paid barely anything to support themselves or other dependants. It’s a huge hit just to go to school and anyone that had monthly expenses just couldn’t afford to stop working. Forever being an apprentice at apprentice wages.
One last issue I have is the schooling. I can’t learn in a classroom but I was forced to cram what felt like a years worth of knowledge into 8 to 10 weeks. It’s an awful experience and everyone just cheats because it’s too costly to fail and repeat. And to top it all off, I worked with a lot of older guys who flat out refused to teach me anything on-site like I am required to learn. There was no way for me to get ahead.
I often felt like the apprenticeship program was just a huge exploitation program designed to break people. Or maybe I just had bad luck.
Sexism is the real killer. You loose half of the population from the pool. It not just a generational problem, the old guys teach this crap to the young guys and the young guys pass it on. My brother-in-law sucks with all of his sexist, anti-lgtba2+, racist bullshit. I keep getting told “it’s alright, he is in construction”. Well it’s not fucking alright, the kid is not even 25. I don’t blame people for staying away, they are all business run by sole proprietors so there never will be structure and rules to break the cycle.
Heartbreaking, really sucks you had to go through all that. If that’s a common experience, we’re in trouble here.
Had multiple bros take labour jobs and come back stupider. It’s heartbreaking.
This phenomenon is real AF.
It REALLY depends on who you work for. It’s crazy how varied it is out there.
Unfortunately that is the norm. Its extremely lucky to work trades but not work with the most racist person you know.
Wholeheartedly agree about the trades, toxic shitty men make them living hell to work in, the more successful small business owners in the trades are the less empathy they have for everyone including themselves work work work work work die.