Meta President Dina Powell McCormick and MikeroweWORKS Foundation CEO Mike Rowe join “Mornings with Maria” to discuss a new $115 million workforce initiative providing free training and guaranteed jobs in skilled trades.
Intense demand for workers in skilled trades is leading U.S. companies to ramp up training programs to expand their workforces and poach workers from other companies to fill much-needed positions.
Mike Rowe, CEO of the mikeroweWORKS Foundation, which helps train the next generation in the skilled trades, told FOX Business it was “very surreal for me to see the skilled trades come back into favor.”
“I don’t want to exaggerate, but I can tell you that not a week goes by that I don’t hear from the CEO of a major company or an industry leader who is downright freaking out over recruiting barriers,” Rowe said, adding that many large U.S. companies are establishing their own training programs to attract workers to skilled trades.
“Many companies are making efforts to grease the wheels to speed up the entire learning process,” Rowe said. “Everyone is hiring, and no one really knows how to go about it, because they’re all competing with each other for the same worker.”
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Companies are increasing training programs in the face of a shortage of qualified workers. (iStock)
Rowe said a wide range of companies are looking for skilled workers, from tech companies building data centers and power plants amid the AI boom to defense contractors, home improvement companies, automakers, construction companies and more.
“The government has a ton of skin in the game at this point, as does Ford, General Motors and all the major Fortune 500 companies. It’s almost like there’s some sort of singularity happening around this issue – micro and macro,” he said.
“To me, the most compelling statistic is the five-for-two statistic: every year, when five workers leave the workforce, two replace them. It’s been that way for 12 years, so the math is catching up with us,” Rowe added.
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A Turkish Airlines Boeing 787 aircraft is seen on the production line at a Boeing factory. (Liu Guanguan/China News Service via Getty Images)
Rowe spoke with FOX Business after touring DECKED’s facility in Defiance, Ohio, where the company manufactures sliding drawer systems for pickup trucks. He added that the company is one of many that hire workers in the skilled trades.
DECKED shared an economic analysis comparing workers in skilled trades, including electricians, HVAC technicians and plumbers, to bachelor’s degree holders who do not have an advanced degree, which found that the trades offer a faster path to financial balance with less debt.
The study found that trade trainees can break even in less than a year by starting to earn right after high school or after six to two years of trade school, given the median entry-level salary. In contrast, a college graduate earning the median starting salary who did not work while in school would break even in about three and two-thirds years.
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Tech giant Meta is launching a new academy allowing workers to receive training in a skilled trade for free, with guaranteed employment for all graduates. (Courtesy of Meta)
Rowe said that in speaking with former MikeroweWORKS Foundation Fellows who started their careers in the skilled trades, “it’s shocking how many welders who started three years ago are now in the mid-six figures.”
“It doesn’t shock me, but I see parents continually shocked. I see academics, intellectuals and journalists continually shocked when they see a 25-year-old who thrives on mastering a craft,” he said, adding that he didn’t want to “paint with too broad a brush” because compensation varies depending on circumstances.
“It really depends on the individual, sometimes on the company, but certainly also on geography. But in general, there’s a complete disconnect between the idea that you can make six figures with a skilled trade among a very large number of people, and demystifying it is an important part of leveling up the whole conversation,” Rowe added.
Google is partnering with veterans groups to help 25,000 people access careers in skilled trades amid a labor shortage.
Inside one of GE Appliances’ manufacturing facilities. (GE Appliances)
“What I’m hearing from the 3,600 people we’ve helped through MikeroweWORKS, it may be anecdotal, but it’s much more compelling to me because these are people who got into the trades four or five years ago, and they’re taking the lead right now,” Rowe said. “They decide where they want to live. They decide how many hours they want to work per week or per month.”
Intense demand for skilled workers has led companies to poach sales workers from their competitors, which Rowe says isn’t necessarily good for the country as a whole, but can lead to increased income for those willing to leave to pursue new opportunities.
“I was just in Plano and visited a data center there. I met three electricians, all under 30, all making over $240,000 a year, all poached three times in the previous 18 months for other projects,” Rowe said.
Mike Rowe, CEO and Founder of the mikeroweWORKS Foundation, speaks on a panel at the BlackRock Infrastructure Summit in Washington, DC, March 2026. (Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images)
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“Again, it’s not representative of everything, but I never heard these stories 10 or 12 years ago when we were just starting the scholarship program. I hear them every day now,” he added. “Big changes are happening before our eyes.”
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