Wednesday, August 20th, 2008 at
7:44 pm

Rockstar from another dimension asked:
So I’m tired of office work, and want to start a fresh new career. It seems like some of the best opportunities I’ve found so far, is to join an apprenticeship in the construction trade.
The two that I’m considering most are Electrician and Carpenter, but I’m having a tough time deciding which to do.
Some people have recommended electrician over carpenter in the past, because it is less physical. But I’m worried that an electrician could become a boring job. Running wires all day, and hooking up electrical connections seems like it would be repetitive and boring. (I’ve been a cable guy for 6 months, and I’m already tired of running cable wire, and installing cable jacks.
To me a carpenter sounds more fun. Being able to stand back and say “I built this house”, rather than “I put the wires in that house”. But I’m worried that there might be alot more grunt work. I’m in great shape, I can do grunt work, I just don’t want my main job to revolve around it.
Any advice would help.
Another thing that makes a difference. The carpenters apprenticeship starts me at around $17 an hour and ends at around $30 an hour after 8k hours. Which is enough to live off of.
The Electrician apprenticeship starts me at around $13 an hour, and ends around $34 after 8k hours. So the pay is more in the end, but I’ll go in debt in the beginning working for $13 an hour, since thats much less than my bills.
I’d like to keep my eye open for which has the best advancement opportunity after I’ve reached the max, it would be nice to be able to move on to self employment, or an even higher paying position.
Or perhaps theres some completely different construction trade I should look into that’s better than both?
Thanks for the advice.
brighton electric