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Why many in Gen Z are ditching college for training in skilled trades
A 6-minute news report on young people choosing apprenticeships and trade training over a degree
Why it’s worth your time
Three people carry this PBS NewsHour report by Christopher Booker: a retired steamfitter teaching an intro construction course, a student who left a data science program and now runs a machine shop's CNC equipment, and an assistant principal whose school is putting up a career and technical building. If you're deciding what comes after high school, or rethinking a degree you've started, it shows one real option through the people living it.
Trade school vs college: how to decide
- Watch the report.
Listen for the instructor's description of his union's apprenticeship: the hours, the night classes and the benefits.
- Ask someone in a trade about their first two years.
Find one person: a local union's apprenticeship office, a community college instructor, or a friend's relative who works in a trade. Ask what the first two years paid, what the work asked of their body, and why they chose it over the other options they had.
Good moments for this: before you choose a program after high schoolwhen a degree you started stops feeling rightbefore a talk with family about what's next
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Making it work for you
Every workplace is different. Here’s what to think about before you start, and what might get in the way.
Things to think about
In Booker's report, the instructor says skilled tradespeople can make six figures, and some do. Federal figures for electricians put the middle of the range at about $63,000 in May 2025, with the top tenth earning more than $108,000; where you live, union membership and overtime tend to move it a lot.
What might make this harder
The assistant principal in Booker's report calls these tough conversations with parents. Bring numbers to yours: what the apprenticeship pays while you train, what the degree would cost, and what you'd do if you changed your mind in five years.
Questions people ask
What is the toolbelt generation?
A nickname for members of Gen Z who are choosing skilled trades instead of, or after, a four-year degree. Anchor John Yang uses it to introduce Christopher Booker's March 2025 PBS report, which follows a community college construction course, a union apprenticeship and a high school's new trades push in and around Westchester, New York.
How does a trade apprenticeship work?
In the report, instructor Thomas Stewart describes his union's version as earn as you learn: an eight-hour shift by day and school two or three nights a week, with health care and a pension from the start. Programs vary by trade, union and state; for electricians, the federal Occupational Outlook Handbook describes four or five years of paid training.
Is a trade better than college?
It depends on the person and the trade. The assistant principal in the report says a degree does help financially, and that money isn't the only measure. Comparing one specific program with one specific degree, for you, tends to answer it better than the general question.
What it says, and how it holds up
The case for the trades in this report rests on cost, demand and a wish to make things. The assistant principal puts a top college at over $90,000 a year; the report cites projections that the construction industry alone would need to attract over 450,000 workers in 2025; and enrollment at vocationally focused community colleges is up nearly 16 percent since 2020, according to the National Student Clearinghouse. The on-ramp is the part it shows best: paid work and training at the same time. It's a warm feature, built from people who chose the trades and the educators helping them, so it doesn't spend time on who struggles or leaves. Its setting, a union local in the New York suburbs, is also one where pay and benefits tend to be good; in places with fewer unions, apprentices may earn less and wait longer for benefits. The pay figures here are US ones.
If the cost of college is what's pushing you away from it, the sticker price in the report may be the wrong number to compare. Many students pay well below the list price after financial aid, and the US Department of Education's College Scorecard is a free place to look up what a specific school tends to cost families like yours and what its graduates earn.
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Picked by Truest and described in our own words. The original belongs to its creator. Last updated October 9, 2026. We sell a career membership; where that’s relevant above, we say so.