What is it with plumbers?

OHSCrifle said:

Good friend of mine is a plumber. In 2007 he had twenty employees. Has runs a crew of three today including himself not because of bad business practices, bad economy or bad fortune but by choice. Still charges top dollar every day - but he just turned fifty and his body is destroyed. 

Patrick said:

 I'm turning 40 in a few weeks, i'm toast. 

That's the big downside of many trades that their cheerleaders ignore or wave off.  I turned 50 last month and I'm in great shape.  Office jobs preserved my body so I can wear it out on my own terms (largely on my bicycles).  I love to work on my cars too but rarely more than a couple hours at a time.  I'd be a wreck if I tried to do it 40+ hours a week.

In reply to mfennell :

I don't deny that many people in the trades have health issues.  However, there are others (like me) who are MUCH healthier than our counterparts in our age group who work in offices.

For some, it creates stress on the body.  For some, it means healthy outdoor living with a physical career that keeps them in good shape.

Same thing in an office.  For some, it means they have not beat up their body.  For others it means that they have sat on their butts for 30 years and become a potato.

The construction industry does not automatically mean a broken body.  That is more likely to be a result of bad choices.

Antihero (Forum Supporter) said:

pheller said:

Streetwiseguy said:

In reply to docwyte :

Stuff I have to buy takes money away from the stuff I want to buy.  

Sucks.

Also, my business is stuff you have to buy.

Sucks.

Yes, but my business also tries to be as efficient as possible to make our product available to everyone. If someone doesn't use our product, or we screw something up in delivering it to them, we don't charge them for our time in fixing it. It'd be sweet if I could charge my company, and by extension my customers, based on my desire to work 3 days a week and retire early. I'm sure ya'll would be pissed when your natural gas prices, electricity, or any other utility was twice as expensive. We've got a captured market as well, but you know, they regulate us so we're not dicks. 

 

I assume the 3 day weeks thing is towards me.

 

I'm not being a dick by wanting to do 3 day weeks, they have the option of not hiring me. I don't really seek out work, it's all people chasing me down. It's not a captive market

 

The problem is I'm far better than the competition, this isn't a brag.....they are that bad, and even with inflating my price I'm still not the most expensive. It's a great niche to be in as a small company

This X 10, especially the part about understanding that your competition are berkeleywits...a good reputation will get you far far further in the long run.

I've been really, really lucky.   I did 10 years in the service van and was smart enough to take the previous employer up on their offer to try out sales.  I was also smart enough to realize that no amount of sales volume would ever make that organization happy and when a friend I'd gone through apprenticeship with offered me a job with his company I took him up on it.   That was almost 16 years ago, he's had me on 4 day weeks for the past 2 years so I'll stick around and teach the younger guys.    Best part for both me and my employer is that without the E36 M3ty work environment of the previous shop I've ended up having way more success than I ever had there.   Last year was my best ever and this year is shockingly decent considering everything else going on.   Work smarter, not harder right?

SVreX (Forum Supporter) said:

In reply to mfennell :

I don't deny that many people in the trades have health issues.  However, there are others (like me) who are MUCH healthier than our counterparts in our age group who work in offices.

For some, it creates stress on the body.  For some, it means healthy outdoor living with a physical career that keeps them in good shape.

Same thing in an office.  For some, it means they have not beat up their body.  For others it means that they have sat on their butts for 30 years and become a potato.

The construction industry does not automatically mean a broken body.  That is more likely to be a result of bad choices.

Quoted for truth. I've been in the field for most of 35 years doing everything from digging ditches to industrial electrician to installing commercial doors  My only health issues are the result of loving food and smoking for 30 of those years. Zero joint or back issues. I'm just fat with a touch of high blood pressure and most of that happened off the job. I see a Dr. once a year for the HBP script and thats it. Of you are beat up from physical labor it's choices you made or genetic, and probably genetic for the most part.

In reply to mfennell :

My dad is 66 and been doing construction for roughly 40 years.

Up until the lung issue, which wasn't caused by construction, he was in spectacular shape for a man his age. Hell, with one lung and a bum heart he was chopping his own firewood even. There are Bunches of construction workers your age or older, in fact some fields have an average age over 60 if you believe the numbers

It's not 100 percent one way or the other. 

In reply to 11GTCS :

Oh yeah, reputation gets you everywhere. 

The funniest bit is I don't really consider myself going above and beyond. I just show up, do my job, keep drama to a minimum and get paid

In reply to Antihero (Forum Supporter) :

I agree, I feel we just do the job that I’d expect if I was the client.  With that said, it’s amazing how much business good communication and getting projects done correctly / without drama will build over time.   Seems really simple but a lot of our competition doesn’t seem to get it.  I also have a whole team of excellent subs who share ( or put up with, lol) my project management OCD which is a massive help.   Funny part is even on complicated jobs, if I’ve done my job they go like clockwork and the guys are cracking jokes and busting each other’s chops all day while the work just “happens”. ( I know I’m good when they’re breaking my stones too.)  If your contractor or employer is a screamer and everyone on the project is on edge someone hasn’t done their homework. 

Also, saw on the other thread that your Dad is making good progress.  Which is awesome 

In reply to SVreX (Forum Supporter) :

The poor choice was being serious about baseball and being a catcher from 3rd grade through high school, THEN following up all that premature knee wear with 20+ years of working very physically while usually overweight.  

Patrick (Forum Supporter) said:

In reply to SVreX (Forum Supporter) :

The poor choice was being serious about baseball and being a catcher from 3rd grade through high school, THEN following up all that premature knee wear with 20+ years of working very physically while usually overweight.  

That's me but with skateboarding. A few big crashes that I brushed off as a teenager really hurt now and I'm only 32. Probably in for knee replacement before 40. I try to work smarter these days. 

SVreX (Forum Supporter) said:

In reply to mfennell :

I don't deny that many people in the trades have health issues.  However, there are others (like me) who are MUCH healthier than our counterparts in our age group who work in offices.

For some, it creates stress on the body.  For some, it means healthy outdoor living with a physical career that keeps them in good shape.

Same thing in an office.  For some, it means they have not beat up their body.  For others it means that they have sat on their butts for 30 years and become a potato.

The construction industry does not automatically mean a broken body.  That is more likely to be a result of bad choices.

I almost went off about that myself... again

 I don't know where people get these crazy ideas, though I have an idea, but you'd think that in 40 years as a tradesman I would have seen some indication of this.

It's a myth that I've only ever seen on this forum, but no more ridiculous than the other other trade myths still around from when I was in high school.

I say keep it up because as long as people's ignorance of the trades continues, the job offers and wages keep going up, which is one of the reason's it's going to be difficult for me and a lot of other trades people to retire.

Peabody said:

SVreX (Forum Supporter) said:

In reply to mfennell :

I don't deny that many people in the trades have health issues.  However, there are others (like me) who are MUCH healthier than our counterparts in our age group who work in offices.

For some, it creates stress on the body.  For some, it means healthy outdoor living with a physical career that keeps them in good shape.

Same thing in an office.  For some, it means they have not beat up their body.  For others it means that they have sat on their butts for 30 years and become a potato.

The construction industry does not automatically mean a broken body.  That is more likely to be a result of bad choices.

I almost went off about that myself... again

 I don't know where people get these crazy ideas, though I have an idea, but you'd think that in 40 years as a tradesman I would have seen some indication of this.

It's a myth that I've only ever seen on this forum, but no more ridiculous than the other other trade myths still around from when I was in high school.

I say keep it up because as long as people's ignorance of the trades continues, the job offers and wages keep going up, which is one of the reason's it's going to be difficult for me and a lot of other trades people to retire.

 

 

My problems are more to do with playing sports relentlessly til adulthood then construction. Concrete is tough work though, don't get me wrong.

As for the wages bit, 100 percent agree. Most people say that the trades don't pay well enough.....but they are wrong. You aren't making $15 an hour, hell someone just starting isn't making that. When you tell people $40 an hour is a pretty easy goal......their thoughts change.

My concern wasn't so much about our collective lack of free time, although that certainly plays into my next point: 

Our housing situation is terrible for a few reasons, but I don't doubt part of its because the trades have become less employed and more in demand, and any owner/operator has such tall overheads that they can't "just" charge $20-$40-even $100/hr anymore. 

This puts anyone in the lower income brackets in a bind - they can't work on their own house without knowing proper codes, and they also can't find the time to work on their own house around a 40-50/hr work week, with kids and life/time constraints. They also don't make enough to pay someone 3x their hourly wage to fix or remodel things. 

My neighbor has been renovating his foreclosure house, not as a flip, but as a future home for his family of 4. It's been eye-opening how much time it requires. He's pretty much at it every night and every free day he's got. He hires help (luckily his BIL is a contractor) for anything he can't do, but most stuff he can. I wouldn't doubt that even doing so much himself, he's only barely breaking even in terms of overall costs vs market value - and he paid $40k less than me. Not just are tradesmen labor prices going up, but so are materials. 

So many tradespeople say "well I need to charge $50-$100 in order to make any money and not totally destroy my body and I can't keep up with all the work I have so I charge more to thin it out." 

Then they say things like "if you hire anyone cheaper than me they'll most definitely mess things up and you'll need to call me to fix it!" It's as though part of being a "good" trades person is talking crap on everyone else. 

Oh, so what, anyone that doesn't have the skills or time to do their own projects is doomed to either A) going broke or B) living in a crap hole?

It's as though having a good functional house is now a luxury. 

As other members have proven, you can certainly do lots of stuff yourself and end up with a great result, but having the time helps. I've heard this story a few times - "my dad/grandpa/uncle quit his job for a year to build our cabin or his home" or even "my dad took a sabbatical to build our place and then went back to his old job." That would never happen to today's job market. You quit? Cya. We'll replace your position next week. The only people who have that luxury are at the very top of the income scale. Ironically enough, probably tradespeople. 

In reply to pheller :

What are you suggesting?  Tradespeople should subsidize lower income families?

You wouldn't say that about doctors, or teachers, or policemen. 

And to be clear, I'm not bashing tradespeople for the wages they can demand. 

Instead, I'm merely asking "what are those of us who don't make tons of money relative to our local housing market supposed to do in order to fix and update our homes?" 

We can certainly try to convince younger generations or even our own generations to join the trades. That'll help. I think socialized medicine would help too. Maybe as more white collar office workers start working from home more people will start trying to do the work themselves, like I've been. We can most definitely forgo that new car or toy in favor of spending it on our house. Or coke errr caffiene, that'll help late night productivity for those home projects! 

In reply to pheller :

Buy a cheaper house?

SVreX (Forum Supporter) said:

In reply to pheller :

What are you suggesting?  Tradespeople should subsidize lower income families?

 

You would say that about doctors, or teachers, or policemen. 

...but they do. Teachers and policemen get tax funding based off property values. 

Doctors get paid from CHIP. 

I do know quite a few people who have utilized Habitat for Humanity to find contractors who will do need-based home repairs. I have friends who will provide labor for free to help fix things. 

But we all know there is that gap between "well off enough to afford updates/fixes without consideration" and "not yet poor enough to ask for help." I think that's where the middle class is at these days.

In reply to pheller :

I knew you say that.

How about mechanics? Should they personally subsidize the work on middle-class Americans cars?

Teachers, police, and doctors do not personally subsidize anyone. 

Sounds like I need to ask for a raise

SVreX (Forum Supporter) said:

In reply to pheller :

What are you suggesting?  Tradespeople should subsidize lower income families?

 

You wouldn't say that about doctors, or teachers, or policemen. 

Yes, I would- because those professions *ARE* subsidized for lower income folks through reduced taxes or government assistance in the USA. 

SVreX (Forum Supporter) said:

How about mechanics? Should they personally subsidize the work on middle-class Americans cars?

Should they? That's up to them and their own values. I know of a few mechanics that participate in local charity based repair operations or donate their time through their church.

Brett_Murphy (Forum Patrón) said:

SVreX (Forum Supporter) said:

In reply to pheller :

What are you suggesting?  Tradespeople should subsidize lower income families?

 

You wouldn't say that about doctors, or teachers, or policemen. 

Yes, I would- because those professions *ARE* subsidized for lower income folks through reduced taxes or government assistance in the USA. 

You think doctors, teachers and police should work for free? 

I routinely don't charge my patients for things I do, or I drastically reduce my fees.

In reply to docwyte :

And that makes sense. I do as well for some small businesses I deal with. I do not for large corporations and government institutions. 

Per Google, these are the median incomes for the jobs mentioned so far. 

Doctor - $300k

Teacher - $60k

Police - $67k

Plumber - $54k

I'm not calling into question anyone's personal generosity. I've given lots, and I know lots of generous plumbers. 
 

I'm asking pheller what he is suggesting to address the problem he is describing. 
 

It sounds like he is suggesting a form of socialistic Robin Hood that is funded by the contractors.