Apprenticeship vs Schooling

We likely face severe disruptions in our workforce in coming years. Declining birthrates, both here and abroad, and an arguably dysfunctional educational system will produce worker shortages, tellingly in skilled occupations and professions.

Concurrently, many skilled jobs will disappear (AI replaces cubicle workers while driverless vehicles replace delivery and truck drivers). Generous eligibility for welfare and disability income will further reduce numbers of workers.

There is little to be done at the state level to address birthrates, seductive benefits, or disappearance of jobs. We could, however, enlarge our workforce by easing entry into highly productive careers, by allowing one to start one’s work life earlier, thus extending his productive years, and to allow one to change careers seamlessly.

State occupational and professional licensing require years of college for many professions, and months or years of trade school for many occupations. What if we allowed kids just out of high school to enter their chosen field, at a low rung, earn a living and produce value for society, while learning that trade or profession in preparation for a competency test, leading to the license?

Likewise, allow someone a bit later in life, perhaps automated out of his job, to earn and learn on the job, again in preparation for an eventual license?

If a licensing exam given to applicants, from barbers to lawyers, is worth its salt, we ought have no particular interest in whether the competency was acquired through school, or reading, or on-line, or through working in the field. Let each applicant acquire his skill in whatever way best suits his learning style and individual circumstances.

Apprenticeships – learning while doing – have a long and honorable history, longer in fact than do universities or trade schools.

An alternative: the apprenticeship model.

Widely used in numerous trades and professions since at least the middle ages
Ubiquitous in America until fairly recently: we hadfew trade schools; colleges awarded mostly Divinity degrees. Ben Franklin apprenticed to his brother to learn printing and publishing; Lincoln read law
At an early age, rather than attending college or trade school, kids learned to support themselves, earned income rather than accumulating student debt, and produced for the support of society, while learning the given trade or profession.
Anecdotally, the apprenticeship model induced a certain loyalty to the trade or profession through the “begat” chain: you were loyal to your mentor (and he to his), and wanted to pass along his knowledge and virtue to the next generation.
Many if not most “trades” are learned better hands-on than theoretically (“Book learning”); similarly, most professionals will tell you they learned more the first several years on the job than they did in school.
Apprenticeship learning could be supplemented by outside reading and by the modern equivalent of night school – classes or lectures on line.
One could explore a trade or profession for a few months, and resign if he found it unsuitable, rather than investing years and resources before realizing that unsuitability.
One could much more easily move to a different trade or profession mid-life; how many middle aged folks, with families to support, can take years off for schooling?
Much discrimination against the poor would be eliminated: The poorer you are, the more pressure you are under to take a full time job as soon as possible in life, and not spend months or years in school. An apprenticeship would allow you to support self and family, and be a productive member of society, while learning the trade or profession.

Pathways forward

In lieu of an education requirement to acquire a state license, how about a formal apprenticeship under a current licensee, with appropriate reading or on-line courses; at any time during the apprenticeship, or perhaps without an apprenticeship, the applicant could take a rigorous exam to qualify for the license or certification.

A retail approach to licensing reform, given seventy-plus licensing authorities, would take decades, and incur turf battles in each area. Better to identify our current system as an updated “Jim Crow’, designed to limit competition among providers and to keep the “wrong” people out, and to reform across the board.