Seattle Times article excerpt, 11/16:
‘A big hurdle for homeowners today, said Kevin Powell, a research analyst at the NAHB research center, is that that “are a lot less cognizant of how to take care of homes” than in the past. As the nation has changed from a can-do agrarian society to a less hands-on one, ” a lot of mechanical aptitude has been lost”, he said.’
I thought of one very good customer some years ago. We had completed a fair sized remodel, and gotten along well, when he called me wanting someone to install 3 mini-blinds. I told him that I didn’t have anyone to even call, and that it was a simple matter of driving in a half dozen screws. He offered to pay me $200 to get it done. I said OK, but he had to be there, and the price included a few household tools I was going to buy for him.
What do you all think? Is it single mom-hood (the issue with the above mentioned client, no Dad growing up). Is it specialization? (my client was a TV cameraman, HIS tools were the complicated ones!) Ever been on a job and realized you forgot a tool and taken a hopeful peek into the garage to check out the workbench and found…absolutely nothing? Ever have a grown man offer to pay you to hang a picture?
Is this the decline of Western Civilization, or am I just losing it?
skipj
Replies
>Is this the decline of Western Civilization, or am I just losing it?
Yes. To the first. The second applies to most of your political views <G> but yes to the former. People are getting further and further away from the need to hunt and gather....the need to do anything truly productive to provide for their own needs.....and the outgrowth of that is that they can't take care of themselves. How few people can chop firewood, or grow food, or ........(and I'm not exempting myself, either).......not too many hunter/gatherer/fixer types left.
cloud, Initially it sounds nice that those of us that know a little and carry the tools, will have work. However, it is disconcerting to realize that there are people who cant add in their head, make change...........nor hang a picture.
Remodeling Contractor just outside the Glass City.
Quittin' Time
calvin,
I agree, it's good for business. It just seems to me there is an overall negative for society.
skipj
why is it that Rome fell again?
nah, couldn't have been. Much better ending with the debauchery and all.Remodeling Contractor just outside the Glass City.
Quittin' Time
It doesn't even sound nice. My favorite clients (aside from the pc "they're all my favorites") have been my most capable ones. I love those dudes and dudettes who can fend for themselves, be/c I've found them less likely to blame everyone else when something happens that they were too uncomfortable to just jump in and resolve.
not too many hunter/gatherer/fixer types left.
Too true. I used to worry (and still do) about the things I don't know. Things I feel like I ought to know, like making a decent weld, or plowing a straigh furrow, or tanning hides. Then I started running into people with only one or two skills at all.
The worst aspect of the narrow-specialists, to pick a term, is that they generally they have no situational awareness at all. So, they stand underneath lumber that needs cutting (and ask "Whacher waitin' fer? Huh?") They stand between the bobcat and the wall, or with their backs to the truck delivering the lumber. It can be tiring to have one's head on a swivel watching out for the unwatchful.
I keep hearing that this is a sector of the market that needs "capturing." I'm just having trouble picturing what you have to have in the van to hang curtains & blinds, and assemble furniture, or change handle & lock sets on a door. Especially when you probably have to take the customer down to the bib box to pick out what they want.Occupational hazard of my occupation not being around (sorry Bubba)
I would be horrified to be so helpless, at least before I'm 75. But who knows? Anyway, I know several people who are "not handy"; one is a dentist, in his 30s; I figured any dentist would be good with a drill anyway.
One man I know, in his mid 70s now, grew up on a farm, showed cattle, still has a 1/4 acre garden, but is totally, completely, hopelessly mechanically inept. I guess that's why he went to work on other farms as a cattle hand and then a milk tester. He knows cows, but don't ever put a tool in his hand.
But there's a huge populace who knows nothing about how their house works, or what to do about simple things. As my wife asked one day, "what do people do, if they don't know how to do this stuff?"
Cairo,
Tell your wife what I tell mine:"you're just lucky to be married to a real man, honey!", then (trust me) DUCK!
As to the 75 yr old comment, my grandfather roofed his house for the last time when he was 65. Of course he had my 12 year old a$$ to kick and work and, as I look back, teach.
skipj
Along the same line, I've read several studies in trade magazines saying that young people, in general, aren't going into the trades. In 20 or 30 years there will be a shortage of craftsmen to do any work. On the bright side, maybe those of us still around can start charging as much as doctors or lawyers.
I would be happy if we could start charging the same as plumbers and electricians.
You could - with the right clientele.
Did you read the post further up about $200 for installing 3 miniblinds?
It also makes a big difference if you bid your work. Give a written proposal, get it signed, get a deposit (even on very small jobs). AND pay yourself what the market will bear.
I've done remodeling work in five states (in both urban and rural areas) and always found the same thing: People have a very hard time getting someone to do very small jobs. Once they find that they can't find someone reliable to do quality work they'll pay what you ask.
I've explained to many homeowners that, small job or not, I still have to own the tools and truck, still have to know what to do, and still have to fetch materials and that sometimes the material fetching takes as much time as the job, but still takes my time. Yes, I've had some get peeved and they didn't want me and I didn't want them. But, most have been understanding and simply glad to get someone to show up and do a good job. Sometimes the jobs that seemed (even to me!) to be priced outrageously got me continued repeat work.
Example: A few years back a couple who live ten miles from town needed to have deadbolts installed to comply with a new home insurance requirement. They were actually being threatened with loss of insurance! The local lumberman sent them to me. I went out and took a look, gave them a bid and did the work. When I was done they called me back to add more attic vents and insulation. I made around $40 per hour (8 years ago) and they were thrilled and told their friends.
If I lived in an urban area I would have charged more per hour.
Go for it! Any jackass can kick down a barn, but it takes a carpenter to build one.
Ever have a grown man offer to pay you to hang a picture
Yes
I don't think it's so much a decline in western civ. Maybe a shift though. I think it has more to do with the fact that people's standard of living and income has risen and they can better afford to hire someone to do the manual work.
Who's going to pay have a picture hung, a corp exec with a six figure income or the guy with a 30k year income.
IMO it breaks down into what people can afford to have someone else do, the more they can pay for the more they will hire out.
CAG,
I take your point. I've had clients (Orthopedic Surgeons, NBA players) who are probably contracturally forbidden from picking up a hammer ('Center misses 3 games with swollen thumb, Playoff hopes end!). I was talking more about people who really can't do anything, as opposed to those who make the choice not to.
skipj
Who was that ball player who was out for a while because he cut himself opening a CD package????
We live in an increasingly specialized society. You pick one thing. You do it. For 40+ years.
Ugh.
Scary.
I took out the garbage tonight. Two full bags in one week. Mostly food packaging. That alone is rather scary. Time to seriously get that garden going come spring. At the very least, I should be able to grow my own tomatoes. ;o)
I'll throw a little bit different spin on this drawn from my own experience. Along the lines of what CAG had to say,
I'm a contractor. I have a real hard time paying anybody to do anything at my own home that I know I can do myself, as efficiently as a "pro" in a field other than mine. By this I mean things like cutting my lawn, raking leaves, painting the house, general repairs etc.
My brother is an Account Controller for a Fortune 500 international manufacturing company. He works as many hours Mon-Fri as I do Mon-Sat and I usually average about 55 hrs/week. He will gladly pay to have his lawn cut, leaves raked, house painted etc. One day I said "hey man do you really have it like that? You can afford to pay people to do stuff you know you can do just as well?"
He basically explained to me that he feels he works enough hours during the week, more than enough in fact. His time at home is precious to him. His time with his children is more valuable to him than anything else in his life. That I'll understand this better when I have kids of my own. He also explained to me that he is only willing to work a certain number of hours per week, regardless of what he is doing. Therefore he can make more money doing what he knows how to do, than he can messing around with something that is either less lucrative (leaves and such) or that has a learning curve involved.
This really opened my eyes, although it may seem painfully obvious to some of you. I guess this sort of "progress" in a more and more technical world has nurtured this very business-like way of thinking. With people in ALL fields working more and more hours there is less and less time to "tinker" or hone skills outside of our bread-making, meat and potatoes jobs.
I guess it's job security for all of us. I just got a t-shirt from Milwaukee with a guy on the back holding a circular saw and it says, "nobody ever got a blister from building a website". I liked it because I'm real proud of the hands on, go home dead tired, blood sweat and tears work that I do. However it's a little deeper than just that "rah-rah I'm a tough guy" first look. Computers will never build houses. Technology will (hopefully) make us better, safer, more efficient home. But it will NEVER actually make the homes.
Just my two cents.
>His time with his children is more valuable to him than anything else in his life. That I'll understand this better when I have kids of my own.
The thing he misses is that I remember the time I spent with my daughter building a staircase more than the time I spent with her on the computer. She had a choice yesterday be/t helping me chop wood and watching tv, and chose being outside. Working and being with kids isn't mutually exclusive. Learning a work ethic, learning skills...it's all meaningful.
Point well taken Cloud. However, his 3 yr old daughter has very little interest in building stair cases and such. She would much rather prefer to sit with her Daddy and be read to or to show him how she learned to paint in pre-school, or to have her Daddy attend her dance recital.
His one year old son (shows tons of potential....giggles and points at my diesel truck when I pull up, climbs ANYTHING he can get near) will probably some day be building and fixing with Dad, but now is really not the time for him either.
I doubt very much that work ethic is a topic that can be avoided in our family. It's in the blood.
When I was 6 yearsold I helped my father build a sewing machine table with draws& arms on it to make a bigger work space. That was 29 years ago & they are divorced about 25 years, but my mother still has that table & she is still using it. I got married last month & she made a very beautiful & intricate bedspread and pillow covers for me & my wife.
Building that is my earliest memory, not long after that I remember my father showing me how to hammer a nail & cutting with a handsaw. I have a college education & I never took so much as a shop class. I"ve always worked a trade & I've been told I was lucky by others that I came from a family of carpenters. I know see how lucky I am to have had the chance to learn so much from my uncles & cousins.
I think people in this country or at least where I come from {Long Island,N.Y.} have this notion that if you go to college you are better than someone who works with there hands. The thing is that a college education is now what a High School diploma was 40 years ago. It helps to have it but it guarantees nothing.
Dieselpig
I agree with you brother. Like CAG, I figure I can do anything and it somehow becomes an issue of pride to "do it yourself"
Pride can be expensive.
I started putting a "value on my time. All my time. As a building professional, my time is billed between $60 an hour to $200 an hour depending on the task, Carpenter, Designer, G.C.
If at the min, my time is worth $60 buck an hour, what is my leisure time worth?
If I can get my grass cut for $25 buck and it takes an hour to do it, I have no business cutting my own grass. I can't change my oil for $19.95. Buy the oil, change it and then dispose it, all without spilling a drop? Hell, it's cheaper to pay a shop to do it. I no longer work on my own cars. I no longer paint. I no longer climb on roofs. I've got a great roofer! And he can do it faster, cheaper and better than I can!
My point is, the guy with the shades. he looks at the value of a trip to the hardware store, get all the materials and tools, AND a ladder. And figured how he felt the LAST time he did a little job and figured $200 was cheap.
And yep, it will create opportunities for willing, able and well equiped people to provide services.
And think about it, it used to common to smith your own nails, break and shod your own horses, haul your own water, birth your own babies, prosecute criminals who cross you, bury your own dead...............you get the picture.
> The thing is that a college education is now what a High School diploma was 40 years ago.
True in more ways than one -- today's college grads know less of science and math than the high school grads of 40 years ago.
-- J.S.
I can attest to that
I'm proud of the skills I've learned along my lifes path.. proud of the fact that I'm building my own house with my own two hands, proud of the fact that I've built racing cars that have won races and restored cars that have been reliable for the last 35 years since I rebuilt them..
Yet I can't post a picture on the web or do many things you guys seem to be able to achieve at will.
But what I do with my hands is a hobby. I make far more with other skills.. It shouldn't be that way but it is..
I can relate to both sides of the issue.
As a TV producer and freelance creative director, my days are filled with work and family. Never touched a hammer in my life until I bought my current home. My wife and i are renovating a 1916 bungalow and doing everything ourselves. Lots of learning curve for sure but in most cases the results are impressive, if I do say so myself. Even gone so far as to buy an antique rock-face block making machine to reproduce my foundation block for an addition.
You should see the look on peoples faces when they see me making these things,one at a time, 75 pounds each. family, friends and neighbors think we are nuts. when they ask why, my answer is quite simple. Personal satisfaction. I work with high tech gear and highly skilled people everyday. Occassional my stuff ends up on TLC, A&E and the likes. But in the end I feel pretty empty.
working on the house I feel I am leaving behind a legacy of sorts for my kids. They get involved when they can and the satisfaction is enormous. i want my kinds to appreciate the value of manual labor and doing something for yourself, things I did not experience growing up in spite of the fact that my Dad is incredibly handy.
Anyways, people today are looking for instant gratification all too often. In my experience taking care of a home is never close to instant anything.
> As a TV producer and freelance creative director, .... My wife and i are renovating a 1916 bungalow and doing everything ourselves.
Where are you located? I'm working in TV post production at Paramount in Hollywood, and we're converting a 1926 four unit apartment building into a single family house. Is any of your TLC work home improvement shows?
-- J.S.
I live in Valparaiso, Indiana, just outside Chicago. The work I do as a freelance producer for TLC and other cable channels is as a location producer in the Chicago area. If they have an episode or segment that requires shooting in Chicago/Midwest, they hire me to produce/direct. I guess my interviewing skills make me a "hot" ticket for these type of shows although I think it is the money saved in hiring local that draws them.
Unfortunately no home improvememt shows under my belt. Most recent credits include a few episodes for "A personal story" and a few things for the Travel channel.
I am in development on two home-type shows that will be pitched to TLC as well as HGTV. Considering my location and lack of contacts thought I am sure they are long shots.
Thanks for the background. Good luck pitching your shows.
-- J.S.
I firmly beleive the world is full of stupid people. This is becoming more apprarent every day. Only when I see sites like these do I have faith in Humanity; some really DO have common sense, manual dexterity, and the ability to reason and apply logic...
People pay me all day to do things they cannot do. It's what I do for a living. I fix trucks. It's really very simple, but it's made to be really complicated. Machines don't lie, or evade. They don't change their story halfway through the process, they don't decide they don't want to be fixed. They don't give illogical symptoms or decide what's wrong for themselves.
It is their owners that do these things.
"If your only tool were a hammer, you'd treat everything as if it were a nail"
Many shouldn't be allowed to have tools. Some are seemingly smart enough to forbid themselves.
With the rampant inability of people to handle even the simplest of tasks, I'm wondering how most people can manage procreation without assistance.
Well, if they could, they wouldn't need Dr. Ruth..
Phill Giles
The Unionville Woodwright
Unionville, Ontario
here's my two cents worth. first off, i agree that it is a shame that more people cannot do even the simplest things and i guess i just don't see some chores as work. mowing the lawn, house repair, even laundry and cleaning i can even find fun. DW is a surgeon and head of her department so she is definitely of the clever variety. but she just has a different mentality. she figures she learned her thing and she does it and someone else can do theirs. but anything mechanical or manual and she does not even want to be bothered. famous quote from DW "oh, you have to check the oil?" however, she is an expert at running her department and getting the right people to do the right job. the world takes all kinds, i guess.
two more cents, how many of us who can work with our hands can even begin to comprehend the digital age. and i do not mean just using computers. i mean can we fix them when they're down or can we program them. i sure can't. and, come to think of it, i can't really fix my own car anymore. i never was a good mechanic, but i used to be able to do some things. the steering was loose on my truck so i tried to figure it out. no go, finally went to the shop and the power steering had a faulty relay chip. no way i would ever find that. sometimes i think i am a caveman trying to catch up to captain kirk.
brad.
sometimes i think i am a caveman trying to catch up to captain kirk.
I like that phrase.
I used to tell people I was going into the digital age on horseback, but the puzzled looks ruined the effect.
Who really understands this digital age? Well, I for one do (mostly). Despite having started out in the ancient days of punch cards and Fortran (WatIV), I'm more than passing comfortable with all of the bells ans whistles. Even know what most of the initals mean. And yet, I still know how to "Ride, Shoot, and Speak the Truth," to borrow the title from jeff Cooper's book.Occupational hazard of my occupation not being around (sorry Bubba)