Have you wondered why Plumbers and Electricians charge so much?

Perhaps it's the cost of Medical, income protection and liability insurance that they have to pass on to you. A good percentage of these and related tradesmen are self-employed and their profits are being eaten up by all of the additional expenses.

Think about where your money is really going when you pay that bill.

I can attest to the high costs of running the business.My biggest expense is for workmans compensation insurance.Outragous what I have to pay.As for regular health insurance it is too expensive to even think about.Then add insurance for work vehicles.
It really adds up.
Then there is the time spent searching for and purchasing supplies.I spend hours and hours searchng for the best prices for materials and yet customers do not think they should have to pay me for the time spent doing so.wtf.

Then to make things worse I have to compete with contractors who hire\subcontract with illegal aliens for a fraction of the costs.

Workman's comp, you don't pay that for illegals, if they get hurt on the job you just fire them.

goes into to my husband's health and welfare account.
He is union, IBEW (electrical)

his health insurance. Couldn't afford it and he said that was why he voted for Obama which floored me. I would have thought that he was totally right wing.
Lol, he then said that he couldn't believe that that moron Palin was still getting air time.
Pleasantly surprised.

and subcontractors in construction.

The nine most frightening words to us these days are "I'm a Republicon and I'm here to cut taxes." That has become code for "I'm a Republicon and I'm here to move your taxation for the commons to an insurance company's CEO bank account."

And here I thought it was the fact that they controlled most state licensing procedures and established fairly steep barriers to entry through the use of the apprentice and licensing requirements. That keeps the supply of these trades low relative to the demand, thus increasing costs.

Guys doing siding, roofs, trim, asphalt, concrete etc don't face such barriers. Therefore there are more people 'qualified' to be hired which, relative to the electrician and plumber, means lower wages.

These non-restricted trades also *want* the insurance protections you mention but there is usually too much competition for them to get the bidding high enough to get them.

:rofl:

Do you know anything about plumbing and electrical work? They're both quite difficult to learn, and the problems for homeowners when failure occurs is often fatal.

Forgive me, but it doesn't take long to get up to speed doing siding and trim. I know because I was able to do it. Plumbing and electrical work are skilled trades that take time to learn, and are well-regulated for safety. They cost more because of it.

"Restricted trades" = "guys who are held responsible for fucking up." :hi:

What I spoke about was the fact that there are barriers to entry in those trades that don't exist in lower wage trades. Access through those barriers is controlled largely by the "elders" of the trade within each jurisdiction's regulatory system. The same thing is at work in medicine with the AMA.

Those are easy to verify facts that have the economic consequence of maintaining a high wage relative to trades that don't have such barriers.

A good case can be made for this structure and I'm not recommending to keep it or to change it; that is a separate discussion as far as I'm concerned. If you'd like to pursue it, why not argue the side you are being critical of and I'll seek to justify the restrictions from the view of benefits to society.

So far, I've given you one bullet point, and you've given me one.

...but put quotation marks around "qualified" in your other post to describe licensed workers? :D

I put quotation marks on qualified when referring to the trades without significant barriers. That "qualified" refers to being able to go into business with as little as a name card and $75 for a business license.

How do you know your position is right if you can't put forth the opposing view? Just for the record, I'm not against reasonable protections for labor (including unions) and consider the apprentice system to be sorely under-utilized.

electrical trades, and you don't want an idiot wiring your house or your office building, trust me. And the "barriers"? 90% of the barrier exists inside the new apprentices -- less than 10% of my son's class (5 yrs of on-the-job training and schooling combined) had the brains and/or sticktoitiveness to finish the training. The local union is ALWAYS trolling for prospective students, but there ain't much out there. Seems no one wants to get dirty anymore. I got news for them -- pretty soon they're all going to be in the dirt, growing carrots and such, if they don't wise up.

But again, that is a separate point from the one I raised. This isn't a revelation, the apprentice system has been used to both enhance compensation and guarantee quality for many, many hundreds of years.

people from becoming electricians/plumbers that the wages of those folks was artificially kept high. This is true (except for the artificial part), and I'm glad of it. My point was that at least 90% of the shortage is due to people not being able to handle/learn the work and dropping out of the program. That's hardly the fault of the apprentice system. Yes, you are expected to show up, you are expected to go to class, you are supposed to get dirty, and you are expected to pass the tests. I don't find any of this onerous, nor do I think the program imposes artificial barriers, like the ones for doctors--the hideous residency programs where you are kept awake for 36 hours straight as some sort of endurance horseshit.

Now you're splitting hairs on a bald head.

If their work fails it can be fatal as well.

Our limiting factor is the amount of work it takes to do the job. That excessive work keeps most people out of the trade so we get or got, in my case, paid well. Not too many people want to do it. Like everything else after one gets used to the work its a pretty easy job to do but getting used to it is the stumbling block here. In my life time I have worked as an equipement operator, dozer, backhoe etc, house framer, house trim carpenter, building cabinets and so forth. I'd been an electrician for over a decade working primarily converting machinery in a foundry from being controled by a series of relays to being controlled by a computer, like the one I am using now but for some reason I always gravitated back to finishing concrete. I enjoyed the hard work so much. Now I have clogged arteries so I'm simply not able to do the work anymore. At all of these trades and others too I am or was an accomplished worker, I know what I'm doing and was good at it no matter what it was. Of all the jobs I've done I dislike painting the worst. Which is what I'll be doing here as soon as I get off this computer, painting our utility room. My thing is if its not perfect I didn't do it, if its worth doing its worth doing right.

And yes, I've done concrete work, my Dad had a driveway business. Level of physical difficulty does reduce the labor pool and raise the wages, but it is a separate factor from a barrier to entry. just suppose for a minute that for some reason the concrete trade was able to justify that it should take 2 years of night school, a test, an apprenticeship, another test, a period as a journeyman, and another test before you were allowed to go into business planning and selling concrete work. What would happen to the supply of small concrete businesses and what would be the effect of the price of labor?

The difficulty level price component would still be there.

What would happen in my estimation is there would be a lot of pourly placed and finished concrete cause so many would be doing it themselves even though they know nothing of how to do it properly. I do understand what you're saying and can't but agree with that. One of the reason we could charge so much, in my way of thinking, was because a lot of guys have helped someone place and finish some concrete at some point in their lives and they know they don't want to do that again so they hire us to do it for them and are willing to pay. I never had a person balk on paying for the concrete work I done after the job was finished but I had many who would try to 'jew' me after the fact in the other trades though, never was that true with concrete. Another thing I noticed in my work history was when I did work for someone who didn't actually work for their money they almost always tried to give me a hard time when it came time to pay where with the ole boy who works for a living always couldn't pay fast enough. People who were given their wealth were the worst of the worst of the lot too. Many of times I done work for people who were better off where they would stall, hemhaw around and such trying to keep my money a little longer but that was never the case with good honest hard working people that I done work for.:hi:

Concrete is the most forgiving of all the materials I've worked with but only up to a point then it is as hard as a rock where you have to deal with it with hammers and crowbars and lots of back breaking labor.

But part of having the control of licensing AND regulation is that a group can prohibit individuals from doing at least key elements of the work themselves.

I also worked as a stonemason's assistant to help pay my way through school. That is a profession very similar in many ways to concrete and in many cultures it has a long history of being guild controlled.

Of all the work I've done I liked the fact that us finishers could count on our competitors to help us out when we had a job that was too big for just our crew or vise versa. Even though we were competitors we would all be ready and willing to go help our tradesman friends out at the drop of the hat. No other trades I worked in would that be true.

Now I know why I like you :-)
Peace to you

"Anyone can buy paint."

There's a big range between a dauber and an Artiste.

Your resume would indicate such.

and made into a postal clerk there. Which was excellent duty btw cause everyone wants their mail even the Captain :-)

:wtf:

I charge what I do. It's because I will not hesitate to shove my hand into a commode full of shit to clean it out. Where most people have to quit puking first, I will do the nasty shit that you won't.

Thats why I get paid what I do.

their time is also taken up with taking the calls coming in asking for help, driving to and from the call, ordering parts and supplies, maintaining their tools, etc. They should be compensated for that time as well - and the only way to do so is charge a little more for the time where they are actually practicing their craft.

;)

I love electricity, too, but given a choice between indoor plumbing & electricity, I'd choose the plumbing, hands down.

And ditto to what jschurchin said, above!!! :thumbsup: :thumbsup:

buy some pants that fit.

are unbelievable for self employed small businesses. This combined with unemployment, work comp., health and blanket liability insurances, business licenses, compliance, ever increasing cost of materials all make these trades pricey. What is your source of income?

I lived and worked in so called "Right to Work States" the contractors charge you out the wazoo but they don't pay us shit. Let alone benefits.

With 11 years of service in I was still only getting 8$ an hours.
I did good work, I knew what I was doing, I was on time and sober.
I had to fight to get paid for overtime worked..to the point that I turned it in to the labor board because a contractor forced us to work 6 12hr days and 10 hrs on Sunday to finish up a job. Saying he would catch up on the overtime at the end of that particular job..we did not get paid we got fired for asking for what was owed us and the real kicker the sob knew he was breaking the law because he was a senator for the state of Alabama. I eventually got a settlement of 2600$ in overtime due me (after taxes) and the other 25 or 30 on the crew.

If I had reported it in Nazibama I maybe would have been found in a ditch somewhere likely. I had moved to another state then happened to be near the labor offices one day on other business, but happened to have copies of the time cards I had filled out, and a list of the other crew. (the ones that gave me a ration of crap over whether or not I was gay) Hey I carried around the same 10feet sections of 4 inch pipe like the rest, and pulled wire and....
That is just one. We were promised health insurance at every contractor after 90 days, they would cut your hours or lay you off on the 88 day, making you ineligible under their fucked up rules.
I ran a service truck with a helper, the helper got minimum wage I got $6.50-7$ when in union job I would have been pulling at 15 to 25$ per hr, the shop charged 80$ an hour for me the helper and the truck plus what ever materials used.
Now I know the cost of that truck was already covered since it was a 1964 (this is in 1985) had only 2 forward gears no revers and NO Brakes, it barely ran. They had about 15 trucks and all were in similar condition and it was not only this one contractor in Montgomery that had unsafe equipment.

I did know what I was doing I went to school and apprenticed to my uncle for 2 summers in high school, I helped my dad build and wire our house too. I also was trained in heavy industrial and commercial electrical systems. I also did controls and custom control panels as well as custom control lay outs for things like factories and drawbridges with safety interlocks.
I was also trained Air Traffic Controller too, but we know what RunnyRaygun did to our union.
It did not help that I was gay and no I did not 'bring' that to work.
I kept that to myself, some assumed that I was because I did not have a girlfriend or wife. I don't think that was any ones business. I had some ass energize a 480 volt panel for an hvac system that I was working on the controls for nearly killing me.

Bouncing paychecks are fun too.
I found that all the Montgomery contractors were in their own little group that fixed wages Unlawfully at that point I left nazibama never to return.
I was not the only one subject to that treatment either. At least 2 others that I worked with were fired because they dared to stand up for me when brought up on the charge of being a queer. They were straight and had families to feed.

I know there are contractors that are on the up and up, but I sure as hell didn t find any in Alabama or Fla that were not above a little cheat the worker if they thought they could get away with it. I was fired for on the job injuries when sent into an attic when Osha had just left the site saying no one in attics today because its 110 outside its 150 or so in the attic.
I did eventually leave electrical work to do sales.

In Bergen County N.J. it is seriously expensive to get someone in to do the work. It seems fair to me though. It's hard work and if you have someone good doing it then it is totally worth it.

I'm sure there are lots of reasons it costs so much and health insurance is surely one of them.

I have worked with other people who think they can do electrical work. Just because it works doesn't mean its right. I have seen unbelievable work done. I rarely do sidejobs, one because no one wants to pay the going rate, two I get a hard time because of my gender and three, I have turned jobs down after seeing what a homeowner or someone who thought they were an Electrician had done. If there ever happens to be a fire the first thing they will ask "Did you have electrical work done?" NO THANKS. Electricity can and will kill.

how ignorant I am about "electrician work"
It is not something to be fooled with
and should be left only to those who are highly trained.

I found the downlights wired with those brown extension cords that you find in a Walgreens. Needless to say the rest of the house is being rewired.

I found lights wired like that in a Downtown Hotel I was working on, get this; running across plaster lath. Not a good thing. My best friends garage was wired in this fashion with the cords stapled on the drywall. I shudder to think. I mean yeah it works, but there are reasons it isn't done that way.

crawl spaces and bug and rodent areas? (excepting working on new houses, apts.)

and a state licensed master plumber (unlike Joe the "not plumber" Wurzelbacher), I like to remind folks that the plumber protects the health of the nation. Next time you are in the hospital for an appendectomy, remember that the oxygen piping, the suction lines, the hot and cold water pipes, and all the other piping appurtenances keeping your sorry ass alive were installed by a plumber.

To work at the level of master in my state means that you had an apprenticeship at least as long as the surgeon doing the appendectomy, and biennial recertification as well. To be a contractor, you have to carry all the regular insurance for workman's compensation, business auto, and liability, plus specialized insurance for things like boiler work and trenching. Oh, yes, don't forget health insurance for yourself and your family. Perhaps you should also become a corporation so in case you fuck up even once, they won't take your house, which is your only asset, in the inevitable lawsuit that follows.

The true barrier of entry to the skilled trades is the greed of the insurance/litigation complex, not the licensing board or apprenticeship program. It is no wonder, therefore, that the trades are begging for apprentices.

All of the costs associated with a service van to all of the additional costs required for an employee.

My boss is always bitching that people think nothing of paying $100 an hour to fix an appliance, but expect electrical work to be done for next to nothing.

Not to mention vehicle operation expenses. Equipment purchase and maintenance costs. Continuing education costs and licensing fees.

Really, most of the plumbers/electricians I know are either small business owners of less than 10 employees or sole proprietorship. None of the ones I know have, nor provide, health insurance. I too am in the service industry and this is the norm for most of us.

It really isn't just the health insurance issue, however that's a good point since many would love to have some kind of coverage. It's that there's a tremendous overhead in these industries which most people never take into consideration. Most people simply think a "service" person making that type of hourly wages is a rip-off. As if the person gets to put all the ticket amount into their own pocket. :eyes:

I've done a lot of them.

and send them to special people.

Of course we have to keep on the advertisers to shut off their revenue.

So long as they're honest, their work is worth every single dime. I'd like to see a decent healthcare plan for these independent, hard working folks for the sake of them having it. Then, I'd also hope to save a little coin if I need work done.

I mean really small, like 1,200 people.

I told them I needed a new dedicated line for my washer when it spins. The water was backing up in the toilet across the house. All three of them dug trenches to look busy and did NOT solve my problem, they just messed around in the dirt.

I argued with the last stupid bastard. He got his snake stuck in the old line that I had told him NOT to mess with. I stopped payment on his check. I should never have paid the first 2 at all.


:wtf: :wtf: :wtf:

Between paying for health insurance and injury compensation liability, the costs do ad up.
Wait......That's right, I'm a Canadian. We don't have this problem.
We have a government regulated/managed health system that keeps costs under control.

Sorry, I do not know how you feel.

Yep, the Canadian friend said it well. Reasonable regulation, health care as a right.

Good for business, good for people, good for us when we get it.

:hi: