What Happened?

If you’re deciding between college and a trade, a skilled trade might pay better than you think. Graduates of Pennsylvania College of Technology typically start around $65,000, and many have job offers before they graduate, the school’s president told a House panel on Friday, Sept. 4, The Signal reported. ​

The House Appropriations defense subcommittee, chaired by Rep. Ken Calvert (R-CA), held the field hearing at College of the Canyons in Santa Clarita, Calif., to look at the country’s shortage of skilled tradespeople, a Legis1 preview of the hearing noted. Besides President Michael Reed of Pennsylvania College of Technology, the panel heard from Eric Chewning, an executive at shipbuilder Huntington Ingalls Industries, and Michael Cadenazzi, the Pentagon’s top official for industrial base policy.

Why Does It Matter To Me?

The military can’t build ships and weapons without welders, machinists and electricians, and there aren’t enough of them. Calvert cited estimates that the country needs 320,000 new welders by 2029 and 200,000 to 250,000 more shipyard and maritime workers over the next decade, according to his opening remarks.

That means the government is paying to train people for those jobs:

  • The Pentagon gave $10 million in July to Mike Rowe’s mikeroweWORKS Foundation for trade school scholarships through its new Build Freedom campaign.
  • The Labor Department proposed turning the San Diego Job Corps Center into a shipbuilding training hub with Huntington Ingalls, the department announced Monday, July 27.

Both Sides, Now

Calvert blamed a long-running stigma against trade work, saying today’s factory jobs are safer and cleaner than in decades past. Others at the hearing pointed to pay and location, saying the jobs need competitive wages and should be created where workers already live.

Money alone hasn’t fixed the problem so far. The Pentagon spent more than $5.8 billion on the shipbuilding industrial base from 2014 through 2023, yet shipbuilders still face workforce challenges that have made the Navy’s goals “difficult to accomplish,” the Government Accountability Office (GAO) found in February 2025.

What Happens Next?

A hearing doesn’t spend a dime by itself. Calvert’s subcommittee writes the Pentagon’s annual spending bill, so what it heard in Santa Clarita could shape how much goes to training programs.

That bill isn’t done yet. A stopgap measure keeps the government funded through Friday, Dec. 11, Federal News Network reported, and lawmakers don’t return from their election break until Monday, Nov. 9.

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