The Modern Factory Job

Factory jobs have changed rapidly and drastically since the days of Ford and Taylor when armies of low-paid laborers toiled in production lines to create products from toothpaste to automobiles. Most people today rarely set foot inside a factory, let alone work in one. Consequently, many people assume that this is still how factory work is done. The reality of the situation could not be any farther from that image.

Today, even the largest scale factories bent on mass production only employ a couple of hundred people, many of them educated and well paid. In today's factories, employees with advanced degrees can be as numerous as those without, because much of the backbreaking labor that was once performed by human beings is now done by robots. So today's typical factory worker-if there is such a thing-works to maintain and upgrade the robots, develop more efficient workflows, and solve other logistical or engineering problems that may arise.

The persisting image of drab and awful work in manufacturing has led many bright young potential managers and engineers away from a truly rewarding field. This article will explore a few ways that manufacturing has changed as an industry and what that means for the job market.

Factories Pay Well for Highly Skilled Workers
It should be no surprise that manufacturing careers look almost nothing like they did as recently as a generation ago. In addition, the more traditional factory occupations that still exist are the more highly skilled and high paying ones like machinists, electricians, and mechanics. Even they have evolved with technology, becoming more efficient and requiring less human input.

For example, an entry level machinist, after completing a one or two year apprenticeship, typically earns around $40,000 per year and someone with ten years of experience as a machinist can expect to make much more. Furthermore, wages are on the rise due to chronic demand for skilled factory workers. Nationwide, the manufacturing industry supports about 17.2 million jobs.

Manufacturing Remains a Stable and Growing Industry
One thing that has not changed much is that manufacturing is profitable. Demand for manufactured goods generally stays very stable. In 2012, manufacturers contributed nearly $2 trillion to the economy. As a result, much of the volatility in both employment and stock prices prevalent to the software or biotech industries does not affect manufacturing as badly. The stability of the manufacturing industry is partly responsible for its overall productivity growth of 2.2 percent last year, compared to the 0.7 overall growth of the private sector.

There is a Generational Skills Gap in Manufacturing
Outsourcing to countries with less expensive labor like China and Mexico was the normal in American manufacturing from the 1980s up until fairly recently. However, that trend has been reversing as labor costs rise in those countries while quality remains low and transportation grows more expensive. While American labor is costlier, the savings in transportation and the ability to control for quality so much more easily has brought employer demand for factory workers back to the United States.

The manufacturing industry faces a major hurdle in the fact that almost nobody in Generations X and Y has the skills that the industry needs. Employers see younger people as better investments because they will last longer in the job market. Recently minted graduates of engineering colleges with specializations in manufacturing are entering a favorable job market, and entry level manufacturing jobs will be plentiful for some time to come. Technical colleges are also providing the types of specialized training programs necessary to excel in this industry.

Editor's Note: Alex Faubel enjoys writing about topics related to business and technology in career-focused education programs.