'Practically every major industry is desperate': Mike Rowe throws his support to Meta as it offers paid training for guaranteed jobs in the trades

All AWA graduates are guaranteed a job with a Meta partner construction site once they’ve graduated the five-week course. But Meta isn’t doing this only out of the kindness of its corporate heart.

“Practically every major industry is desperate to hire more skilled workers,” wrote Rowe and Meta president Dina Powell McCormick in a WSJ post. “At Meta alone, we anticipate needing thousands more workers as we build infrastructure to empower students, families and small-business owners.” Rowe and McCormick also discussed the program on the Fox Business show “Mornings With Maria.”

Here’s why Meta and other big corporations are investing so much in the trades right now.

The trades push

Lowes, BlackRock and Google have also put money toward training new tradespeople — to the collective tune of $365 million. They hope to train around 300,000 new workers by 2036.

The federal government has also put its hat in the ring, releasing a new rule that allows vocational program students to use Pell Grants.

In 2024, McKinsey put out a report on the increasing trades shortage. It found two major problems behind this: an aging workforce and cultural bias against tradesworkers.

The U.S. population is getting older: By 2030, one in five people will be of retirement age, projects the Census Bureau. They also project that, by 2034, older adults will outnumber children for the first time in U.S. history.

As the general population gets older, more and more people age out of the physical jobs that dominate the trades. In order for work to continue sustainably, retired workers need to be replaced by younger workers.

But younger people are being pushed away from the trades as a career. Only 7% of Gen Z parents say they would want their children to pursue a vocational program, per a 2025 report from Jobber. At the same time, 71% of Gen Z say there’s stigma around going to a vocational school.

All of this, along with the trades’ high job churn, means employers are having a tough time hiring enough trades workers.