Owyn_Merrilin said:
Then people get to college and realize that "professionals" careers are for snobs who like to enforce codes of morals on other members of the "professional" career that have no bearing on the job, on ethics, or on the law. Professionals are those who profess to be better than everyone else. Tradesmen are men who trade stories about how ridiculous the professionals are.
If I sound bitter, it's because I went for a professional degree that involves a ridiculous code of morals, and I mean stupid shit like not being able to go to a bar without risking getting fired. Teachers: they're not allowed to be human.
You definitely got something of a skewed point of view there, and other professions (such as my own, engineering) are actually not quite as... stringent with the code of conduct. The issue with teachers is that there's a lot of paranoia these days, parents are extremely defensive about their children (or depending on location, neglectful and/or abusive; sad but true); there's also the matter of the same parents have differing views on what's being taught, which they can be against for the silliest of reasons. That being said, it's generally easier to cope with these issues
if you understand why they are issues.
And to be perfectly honest, the tone of your post is decidedly... unprofessional. While it's understandable that everyone should be able to express their opinion, one of the most difficult parts of professional conduct is being able to do so while still remaining civil about; you can't smear or blindly criticize someone, you have to say why their words and/or actions are wrong. "Easier said than done" is a pretty large understatement, especially when something is really testing your patience.
Which brings me to my next point, the statement that professionals consider themselves than the common populace; and to put it bluntly, this arrogance is almost certainly true....
but justified. The classic phrase
"With great power comes great responsibility", or the older variation of
"Noblesse obligé" ("nobility obliges"), comes full force. "Professional conduct" means holding yourself to a higher standard than the common populace; you can't simply have the attitude of being superior to everyone else (in fact, you should probably do your best to avoid this pitfall as much as possible),
you have to be better than everyone else. The reasons for this quite simple, and it's the same reason professions exist in the first place;
professionals are there to do things right. Society doesn't want your average joe designing a bridge, doing open-heart surgery, or teaching children; society wants
someone better to do it.
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With that detour out of the way, onto the real topic - trades.
Trades are actually very valuable these days; and if you're willing to move to where all the major projects are happening (for example, the oilsands),
they pay extremely well to boot. They're a bit rarer these days, with the big push towards mandatory education over the last few decades; this is actually one of the bigger reasons why they're so valuable and pay well, they're just that much more in demand.
Still, there are a few downsides to trades. One of the most prominent is that it's invariably tied to construction (or manufacturing); be it houses or industrial projects, they have to deal with all the issues that come with it. These are commonly long work hours (12-16 hour days) and shift work (ten days on the job, then four off, repeat), having to go to remote locations for extended periods, and sometimes even a temporary construction season (the off-season is better known as "winter"). Combine this with the matter that trades are not the best "self-starters" when it comes to work, and things become even more problematic. If the work you once had goes away (out-sourced to somewhere cheaper or simply no longer viable), your skills can become useless; you either have to move to somewhere else in order to continue using your tradeskill or find something else to do.
Anyhow, trades are still valuable. The problem is that they don't really lend themselves to having a sustainable lifestyle; long & irregular work hours may be the norm, which means the prospect of a "family life" isn't looking too good. Tradespeople are usually young adults for a good reason; they're what people do to get started after finishing high school, many move onto to other jobs & careers later in life.
