I'm an electrician. I used to be a programmer. I still program for fun and sometimes get small gigs.

In my city the pay scale for the first 5-7 years of a grad software engineer and grad electrician careers are comparable and I expect that to be the case in most of the world outside the handful of American bubbles. One thing I enjoy is that the minimum pay is regulated by a union so I don't have to hop job every year to make sure I'm not underpaid.

After that the salaries diverge quite quickly and the ceiling is much much lower as an electrician.

It's still pretty good money, though, so I don't think that's really a con to this career.

What was the transition like? How did this article's description of union electrical work as like the "McKinsey partner" of the trades world strike you?