The difference is the physical aspect of the trades. The design for wiring can be (and already has been) automated, but you physically need an electrician on site to pull the wires. So I can see a hollowing out of the engineers, but not the actual electricians.

That being said, the absolute focus on trades from the fed right now just reeks of the wild pendulum swing. It used to be 'go to college to get a good job' then we had too many college grads. In ten years we'll have a glut of people trained in the trades with no prospects.

It just keeps swinging back and forth and somehow Joe Regularworker keeps losing.

Yeah, things change. What do you propose to do about that? The only people who lose are the ones who can't accept that they may need to change careers to make more money.

Indeed. If you squint a little, it kind of looks like the machines are trying to shift to a world where we are just meat puppets to do the tricky stuff there aren't robotics for (yet). :(

Have you seen what Unitree G1 can already do? I see the writing on the walls for going onsite and pulling wires.