May 7, 2024 • 16 mins
Mark Erlich, a former carpenter who is now a Fellow at Harvard, gives us a look at the jobs market, and the ascendance of the “toolbelt generation.”
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:05):
Welcome to On the Job. It's hard to believe it
that this is now our eighth season, so a sincere
thank you to those of you who've been listening through
the years. We're thrilled to have you back, and to
you newcomers, welcome in. We've got a lot of great
stories coming your way because on this season of On
the Job, we're going to be focusing our attention on
(00:26):
people who have made some pivots in their careers, because
while things are looking pretty good out there, if the
recent years taught us anything it's that life and the
workplace are filled with uncertainty. But as we're going to
hear over the next eight episodes, change doesn't have to
be a bad thing to stick around. If you're not
(00:51):
sure how to feel about the economy these days, you're
not alone. It's an admittedly confusing time right now. On
one hand, we've got quite a low unemployment rate and
arising GDP, which are both great statistics. Yet at the
same time, consumer confidence is shaky, and according to a
recent Pew Research poll, when Americans were asked how they
(01:14):
feel about the economy, about three and ten said it's excellent.
Well nearly the same number of people said the exact opposite.
So to try to make sense of what's going on
out there, I gave a call up to Boston, Massachusetts
to speak with author, labor historian, and fellow at Harvard
Law mark Erlick, to help us cut through some of
(01:35):
that confusion and gain a better understanding of how our
economy is faring and what might be coming our way.
Mark Erlick, thank you for being on the podcast. Let's
jump right into it. How's it looking out there to you?
Speaker 2 (01:50):
Well, I actually think it's looking quite good. You know,
there's the issue of perception and reality and how it's
perceived politically about the reality is that the job market
keeps climbing, that we have come out of the pandemic
better than really any other country in the world, and
I think there are a lot of opportunities. I would
(02:11):
say that to the degree that what our future holds
in some ways is dependent on the election in November
and whether the current trends continue or whether there's a
sharp turn to a different set of politics and economics.
Speaker 3 (02:26):
You mentioned the election.
Speaker 1 (02:28):
Is there anything else we should sort of have on
our horizon to be aware of?
Speaker 2 (02:32):
Yeah, I mean, you know, there's all sorts of shocks
that come that nobody can ever anticipate. Certainly, I think
the Russian invasion of Ukraine ended up having global consequences
that nobody expected and nobody anticipated. So you know, I'm
not about to pull out my crystal ball and tell
you what shocks are on the way.
Speaker 3 (02:51):
I don't know.
Speaker 2 (02:52):
But if if we presume that basically the essential elements
of economic life continuous, they are, you know, I think
the future is pretty promising, and there's a lot of
federal dollars that are going to be invested in the
economy that you know, while the infrastructure bill was passed
a couple of years ago, those dollars are really only
(03:16):
getting on the ground now and in the near future. So,
you know, particularly for folks in the construction industry, the
outlook is pretty promising.
Speaker 1 (03:26):
As Mark told me, there's only so much crystal ballgazing
one can do. As a historian, he knows that unforeseen
surprises are both unpredictable and inevitable. However, there is one
thing that we can all see coming our way, and
that's AI.
Speaker 2 (03:44):
I think for the majority of jobs, I don't think
in the short term is going to be much of
an impact one way or another. I think twenty five
thirty fifty years out, the impact of AI is probably
going to be incomprehensible.
Speaker 1 (03:59):
Means well, we might not be able to fully grasp
what a world with AI is going to look like.
Mark suggests that we don't necessarily have to fear it
or fight it tooth and nail. Sometimes the best way
to prepare for our future is to understand our past,
and so Mark looks to previous innovations like the computer
(04:20):
and Internet, which were certainly disruptive to some, but instead
of eliminating tons of jobs, they've been incorporated into them,
allowing people to do their jobs better.
Speaker 2 (04:33):
If you walk on the construction site and you open
up the old gang box where everybody used to store
the tools, nine times out of ten you open up
the gang box and the inside of the lid is
a flat screen because everything is done on iPads. Now
that the foreman, that the lead electricians, lead carpers, will
have an iPad, and the architects will be shooting drawings
(04:53):
back and forth.
Speaker 1 (04:55):
And at least for now, it seems unlikely that AI
will be able to replace a plumber or an electrician
anytime soon, which is a great thing because those types
of jobs, the sort of skilled trade jobs, are having
quite a resurgence these days. And Mark, a former carpenter himself,
which we'll hear more about in the second half of
(05:16):
the episode, says, not only are those jobs quite plentiful
these days, they were also finally getting their respect they deserve.
Speaker 2 (05:25):
Yeah, I think that's been an interesting process. I think
that's for two reasons. One is that guidance counselors in
high schools and families works kept saying college, college, college, college.
You got to go to college if you're going to
have a secure living. And what happened when you graduated.
(05:45):
You had a pile of student debt and you were
a barista or an uber driver, and the prospects, the
employment prospects were not anywhere near what they had been
projected to be. On the other hand, if you do
blue collar work, if you frankly, if you go say
through an apprenticeship program, you are earning while you learn.
(06:08):
There is no debt. You're learning a skill. In four
years and you've become a licensed electrician or you become
a master carpenter or whatever, and the occupation may.
Speaker 3 (06:18):
Be, and you have been.
Speaker 2 (06:20):
You've been making money that entire time, and you're well
on your way towards, you know, having a secure livelihood.
I mean, you know, not to romanticize these occupations. They're
still dangerous, they're dirty, they're difficult, but it is I think,
becoming increasingly attractive to people when they look, on the
(06:41):
one hand, as college tuitions keep increasing and increasing, that
becomes an attractive alternative. And I think that's a good thing,
because I think for too long we devalue that kind
of work in the society. And I'm glad to see,
like the enrollment of vocational schools is increasing all over
the country, and that seems to me kind of like
(07:01):
one hundred and eighty degree shift from say even twenty
years ago.
Speaker 1 (07:06):
With soaring enrollment in technical and vocational schools and a
strong jobs market in the blue collar sector, some have
even started calling gen Z the tool belt generation. And
as public opinion of the trades continues to change, so
too are the people drawn to them. For example, women's
(07:27):
participation in the blue collar sector is now at a
twenty five year high.
Speaker 2 (07:32):
Yeah, you know, when I was an apprentice again a
long time ago, back in the seventies, they were sort
of the pioneers who came in with Title nine back
in the late seventies with the federal order, and it
was really very, very difficult. I mean, most of the
guys on the job did nothing one way or another,
(07:53):
but they were always a veryly large number of jerks
who were really hostile. I mean, thankfully those days are gone.
Speaker 1 (08:03):
Mark has even seen support groups for women in the
trades popping up around the country to offer mentoring and
to increase retention.
Speaker 2 (08:12):
You're seeing women in the trades being elevated to leadership
positions in the industry.
Speaker 3 (08:19):
It's a very healthy thing, very good thing.
Speaker 1 (08:21):
And a similar trend is happening with foreign born Americans.
Speaker 2 (08:26):
My parents are immigrants. I'm a big support of immigration.
I think this country was built on immigrant labor, and
the only difference now is that it's instead of being
folks from Southern Europe or Eastern Europe or wherever, they're
coming from Central and South America as well as other
parts of the world. And I think actually that is
(08:50):
a strength of the United States. And I am very
disappointed that it's become such a political football, because I
think we thrive on immigration and and and welcoming new
workers in the industry. So I think that's you're going
to see that that's going to be true everywhere, that
(09:10):
the blue collar workers are going to be I mean,
one of the reasons actually that the job projections are
doing so well is because of the new of the
surge of immigrant labor.
Speaker 1 (09:25):
But the diversity we're witnessing in this toolboat generation is
also being felt in white collar and service industries as well,
where jobs are no longer divided among genders and ethnicities
the way they once were, and as our workforce becomes
more reflective of the community it's built from, that will
(09:46):
only make our economy more resilient and more adaptable to
whatever challenges come our way. When we come back from
the break, we'll hear how mark erlik went from the
job site to the ivy.
Speaker 4 (10:07):
Looking for a job is lonely, endless searching, phone calls
that go nowhere, applications that vanish into thin air. Why
if you could link with dozens of local companies who
are hiring right now with just one connection. That's Express
Employment Professionals find us at expresspros dot com. One connection,
(10:27):
endless opportunities and no fees ever for job seekers, Express
Employment Professionals, expresspros dot Com.
Speaker 1 (10:38):
We're back with Mark Irlick, who, aside from having his
finger on the economic pulse, is the perfect person to
lead off our pivot focus season of On the Job,
because it turns out that Mark has quite the pivot
story of his own, because long before he was walking
those hallowed halls of Harvard, he was swinging a hammer
on a job site as a master car carpenter.
Speaker 2 (11:01):
I'm a carpenter by trade. I was a member of
the Carver's Union. I still am for over fifty years.
I worked as an apprentice, the journeym and a foreman
and superintendent. But I very much valued my time in
the field.
Speaker 1 (11:17):
Was there one area of expertise you had as a carpenter.
Speaker 2 (11:20):
No.
Speaker 3 (11:20):
I tried to be a generalist.
Speaker 2 (11:22):
I did concrete forms, I did drywall, I did framing,
I did finished work mostly, and when I had the
opportunity be superintendent, I had to learn about, you know,
the other trades as well.
Speaker 1 (11:34):
Mark hat a beautiful analogy for his time as a
superintendent in which he was responsible for all these different trades,
each doing their own thing, yet all leading towards the
same end goal.
Speaker 2 (11:45):
At its best, and it wasn't always at its best,
but at his best it was like being a conductor
of a symphony when you had got all the different
trades to kind.
Speaker 3 (11:53):
Of work together to create this.
Speaker 2 (11:55):
You know, someone's vision in their head of an architect,
and you actually made it.
Speaker 3 (12:01):
I think it's a very exciting process.
Speaker 1 (12:03):
And like anyone who spent enough time on our job site,
Mark isn't short on stories.
Speaker 2 (12:09):
So we got we got there on the on the
first day and I said, well, w there's the plans
and he said, well, we don't really actually have the plans.
And I said, well, what do you mean. He says,
I just fired the architect. So I said, well, how
are we going to build this thing? And he says, well,
we have the initial plans that we did and we'll
(12:29):
just work it out now. This was the ended up
being the most expensive by square foot restaurant in Boston
at the time, and the whole thing was done with
this guy would travel on weekends to auctions in India
and Turkey and he would buy bars and things and
(12:49):
he would bring him back and and he had a
storage facility in Boston and he would bring at that time,
Polaroid pictures and he would show me, sayd where are
we going to put this? And I said, well, that
won't fit because we've already got the walls. And he said,
I tear down the walls. So it was a great
deal of fun. It was a little ridiculous. It was
(13:09):
way more expensive than it needed to be.
Speaker 1 (13:11):
For the last twelve years of Mark's career, he became
the head of the entire New England Carpenters Union.
Speaker 2 (13:18):
I got a PhD in constructionology with all those experiences
and the exposure to the issues of real estate development politics,
and because it's really what happens with construction is kind
of I think, the essence of what a community thinks
about itself, how it's going to grow, how it's going
to develop.
Speaker 1 (13:39):
But when Mark reached retirement age, he didn't just hang
up his hard helmet and pick up the golf clubs.
Even after a fifty year career, Mark was still excited
about the construction industry and he had a lot of
knowledge that he wanted to share with others, and there
were some very smart folks who were more than willing
to listen.
Speaker 2 (13:59):
I retired some years ago, sort of semi retired.
Speaker 3 (14:02):
I guess.
Speaker 2 (14:03):
And now I am a fellow at the Center for
Labor and adjust Economy at Harvard Law School, and I
use that platform to teach about labor and politics and
labor history and also to write. I've written three books
and numerous op eds articles on the topics of labor, politics, history,
(14:27):
et cetera.
Speaker 1 (14:28):
And Well, Mark didn't personally work on the buildings at Harvard,
he knows a lot of the tradesmen and women who did. Yeah,
do you ever find yourself at Harvard Law just, you know,
looking at joinery or something like that, just drifting off.
Speaker 2 (14:43):
Honestly, I do most of my work from home. I write,
and I see a lot of it as remote. So,
but you know, when I go there, the Harvard Law
School is has quite the beautiful buildings, and almost all
of those buildings were built by my friends in the trades.
Speaker 3 (15:00):
Uh.
Speaker 2 (15:01):
And I always admire the Uh. It's it's nice to
be there to be teaching in a context of an
environment that my colleagues and friends built.
Speaker 3 (15:14):
Uh. And so that sort of brings it together.
Speaker 1 (15:17):
But there are more than enough buildings all around Boston
that Mark did get to work on.
Speaker 2 (15:22):
Oh yeah, oh yeah, I mean I think everybody who
is a construction worker will go by, We'll drive around
with their kids and say, you know, daddy worked on
that or mommy worked on this, and it's it's a
standard item. Uh, you know, sort of a joke but
also a but a meaningful joke that people again, you know,
I think that's part of the satisfaction of the work
(15:45):
is that you can see that, you can point to
to a structure that you helped create, and that's that's
not a small thing.
Speaker 1 (15:55):
And if Mark Rlick's predictions of a resilient economy that
continues a long hold true, and this tool belt generation
continues to turn to the trades, hopefully in a few
years we'll have a lot more men and women driving
their children around wherever it is they live in this
country and pointing to a building, a bridge, or even
(16:18):
an Ivy League school and saying, you see that, kids,
I built that for on the job. I'm Avery Thompson
Welcome to On the Job. It's hard to believe it
that this is now our eighth season, so a sincere
thank you to those of you who've been listening through
the years. We're thrilled to have you back, and to
you newcomers, welcome in. We've got a lot of great
stories coming your way because on this season of On
the Job, we're going to be focusing our attention on
(00:26):
people who have made some pivots in their careers, because
while things are looking pretty good out there, if the
recent years taught us anything it's that life and the
workplace are filled with uncertainty. But as we're going to
hear over the next eight episodes, change doesn't have to
be a bad thing to stick around. If you're not
(00:51):
sure how to feel about the economy these days, you're
not alone. It's an admittedly confusing time right now. On
one hand, we've got quite a low unemployment rate and
arising GDP, which are both great statistics. Yet at the
same time, consumer confidence is shaky, and according to a
recent Pew Research poll, when Americans were asked how they
(01:14):
feel about the economy, about three and ten said it's excellent.
Well nearly the same number of people said the exact opposite.
So to try to make sense of what's going on
out there, I gave a call up to Boston, Massachusetts
to speak with author, labor historian, and fellow at Harvard
Law mark Erlick, to help us cut through some of
(01:35):
that confusion and gain a better understanding of how our
economy is faring and what might be coming our way.
Mark Erlick, thank you for being on the podcast. Let's
jump right into it. How's it looking out there to you?
Speaker 2 (01:50):
Well, I actually think it's looking quite good. You know,
there's the issue of perception and reality and how it's
perceived politically about the reality is that the job market
keeps climbing, that we have come out of the pandemic
better than really any other country in the world, and
I think there are a lot of opportunities. I would
(02:11):
say that to the degree that what our future holds
in some ways is dependent on the election in November
and whether the current trends continue or whether there's a
sharp turn to a different set of politics and economics.
Speaker 3 (02:26):
You mentioned the election.
Speaker 1 (02:28):
Is there anything else we should sort of have on
our horizon to be aware of?
Speaker 2 (02:32):
Yeah, I mean, you know, there's all sorts of shocks
that come that nobody can ever anticipate. Certainly, I think
the Russian invasion of Ukraine ended up having global consequences
that nobody expected and nobody anticipated. So you know, I'm
not about to pull out my crystal ball and tell
you what shocks are on the way.
Speaker 3 (02:51):
I don't know.
Speaker 2 (02:52):
But if if we presume that basically the essential elements
of economic life continuous, they are, you know, I think
the future is pretty promising, and there's a lot of
federal dollars that are going to be invested in the
economy that you know, while the infrastructure bill was passed
a couple of years ago, those dollars are really only
(03:16):
getting on the ground now and in the near future. So,
you know, particularly for folks in the construction industry, the
outlook is pretty promising.
Speaker 1 (03:26):
As Mark told me, there's only so much crystal ballgazing
one can do. As a historian, he knows that unforeseen
surprises are both unpredictable and inevitable. However, there is one
thing that we can all see coming our way, and
that's AI.
Speaker 2 (03:44):
I think for the majority of jobs, I don't think
in the short term is going to be much of
an impact one way or another. I think twenty five
thirty fifty years out, the impact of AI is probably
going to be incomprehensible.
Speaker 1 (03:59):
Means well, we might not be able to fully grasp
what a world with AI is going to look like.
Mark suggests that we don't necessarily have to fear it
or fight it tooth and nail. Sometimes the best way
to prepare for our future is to understand our past,
and so Mark looks to previous innovations like the computer
(04:20):
and Internet, which were certainly disruptive to some, but instead
of eliminating tons of jobs, they've been incorporated into them,
allowing people to do their jobs better.
Speaker 2 (04:33):
If you walk on the construction site and you open
up the old gang box where everybody used to store
the tools, nine times out of ten you open up
the gang box and the inside of the lid is
a flat screen because everything is done on iPads. Now
that the foreman, that the lead electricians, lead carpers, will
have an iPad, and the architects will be shooting drawings
(04:53):
back and forth.
Speaker 1 (04:55):
And at least for now, it seems unlikely that AI
will be able to replace a plumber or an electrician
anytime soon, which is a great thing because those types
of jobs, the sort of skilled trade jobs, are having
quite a resurgence these days. And Mark, a former carpenter himself,
which we'll hear more about in the second half of
(05:16):
the episode, says, not only are those jobs quite plentiful
these days, they were also finally getting their respect they deserve.
Speaker 2 (05:25):
Yeah, I think that's been an interesting process. I think
that's for two reasons. One is that guidance counselors in
high schools and families works kept saying college, college, college, college.
You got to go to college if you're going to
have a secure living. And what happened when you graduated.
(05:45):
You had a pile of student debt and you were
a barista or an uber driver, and the prospects, the
employment prospects were not anywhere near what they had been
projected to be. On the other hand, if you do
blue collar work, if you frankly, if you go say
through an apprenticeship program, you are earning while you learn.
(06:08):
There is no debt. You're learning a skill. In four
years and you've become a licensed electrician or you become
a master carpenter or whatever, and the occupation may.
Speaker 3 (06:18):
Be, and you have been.
Speaker 2 (06:20):
You've been making money that entire time, and you're well
on your way towards, you know, having a secure livelihood.
I mean, you know, not to romanticize these occupations. They're
still dangerous, they're dirty, they're difficult, but it is I think,
becoming increasingly attractive to people when they look, on the
(06:41):
one hand, as college tuitions keep increasing and increasing, that
becomes an attractive alternative. And I think that's a good thing,
because I think for too long we devalue that kind
of work in the society. And I'm glad to see,
like the enrollment of vocational schools is increasing all over
the country, and that seems to me kind of like
(07:01):
one hundred and eighty degree shift from say even twenty
years ago.
Speaker 1 (07:06):
With soaring enrollment in technical and vocational schools and a
strong jobs market in the blue collar sector, some have
even started calling gen Z the tool belt generation. And
as public opinion of the trades continues to change, so
too are the people drawn to them. For example, women's
(07:27):
participation in the blue collar sector is now at a
twenty five year high.
Speaker 2 (07:32):
Yeah, you know, when I was an apprentice again a
long time ago, back in the seventies, they were sort
of the pioneers who came in with Title nine back
in the late seventies with the federal order, and it
was really very, very difficult. I mean, most of the
guys on the job did nothing one way or another,
(07:53):
but they were always a veryly large number of jerks
who were really hostile. I mean, thankfully those days are gone.
Speaker 1 (08:03):
Mark has even seen support groups for women in the
trades popping up around the country to offer mentoring and
to increase retention.
Speaker 2 (08:12):
You're seeing women in the trades being elevated to leadership
positions in the industry.
Speaker 3 (08:19):
It's a very healthy thing, very good thing.
Speaker 1 (08:21):
And a similar trend is happening with foreign born Americans.
Speaker 2 (08:26):
My parents are immigrants. I'm a big support of immigration.
I think this country was built on immigrant labor, and
the only difference now is that it's instead of being
folks from Southern Europe or Eastern Europe or wherever, they're
coming from Central and South America as well as other
parts of the world. And I think actually that is
(08:50):
a strength of the United States. And I am very
disappointed that it's become such a political football, because I
think we thrive on immigration and and and welcoming new
workers in the industry. So I think that's you're going
to see that that's going to be true everywhere, that
(09:10):
the blue collar workers are going to be I mean,
one of the reasons actually that the job projections are
doing so well is because of the new of the
surge of immigrant labor.
Speaker 1 (09:25):
But the diversity we're witnessing in this toolboat generation is
also being felt in white collar and service industries as well,
where jobs are no longer divided among genders and ethnicities
the way they once were, and as our workforce becomes
more reflective of the community it's built from, that will
(09:46):
only make our economy more resilient and more adaptable to
whatever challenges come our way. When we come back from
the break, we'll hear how mark erlik went from the
job site to the ivy.
Speaker 4 (10:07):
Looking for a job is lonely, endless searching, phone calls
that go nowhere, applications that vanish into thin air. Why
if you could link with dozens of local companies who
are hiring right now with just one connection. That's Express
Employment Professionals find us at expresspros dot com. One connection,
(10:27):
endless opportunities and no fees ever for job seekers, Express
Employment Professionals, expresspros dot Com.
Speaker 1 (10:38):
We're back with Mark Irlick, who, aside from having his
finger on the economic pulse, is the perfect person to
lead off our pivot focus season of On the Job,
because it turns out that Mark has quite the pivot
story of his own, because long before he was walking
those hallowed halls of Harvard, he was swinging a hammer
on a job site as a master car carpenter.
Speaker 2 (11:01):
I'm a carpenter by trade. I was a member of
the Carver's Union. I still am for over fifty years.
I worked as an apprentice, the journeym and a foreman
and superintendent. But I very much valued my time in
the field.
Speaker 1 (11:17):
Was there one area of expertise you had as a carpenter.
Speaker 2 (11:20):
No.
Speaker 3 (11:20):
I tried to be a generalist.
Speaker 2 (11:22):
I did concrete forms, I did drywall, I did framing,
I did finished work mostly, and when I had the
opportunity be superintendent, I had to learn about, you know,
the other trades as well.
Speaker 1 (11:34):
Mark hat a beautiful analogy for his time as a
superintendent in which he was responsible for all these different trades,
each doing their own thing, yet all leading towards the
same end goal.
Speaker 2 (11:45):
At its best, and it wasn't always at its best,
but at his best it was like being a conductor
of a symphony when you had got all the different
trades to kind.
Speaker 3 (11:53):
Of work together to create this.
Speaker 2 (11:55):
You know, someone's vision in their head of an architect,
and you actually made it.
Speaker 3 (12:01):
I think it's a very exciting process.
Speaker 1 (12:03):
And like anyone who spent enough time on our job site,
Mark isn't short on stories.
Speaker 2 (12:09):
So we got we got there on the on the
first day and I said, well, w there's the plans
and he said, well, we don't really actually have the plans.
And I said, well, what do you mean. He says,
I just fired the architect. So I said, well, how
are we going to build this thing? And he says, well,
we have the initial plans that we did and we'll
(12:29):
just work it out now. This was the ended up
being the most expensive by square foot restaurant in Boston
at the time, and the whole thing was done with
this guy would travel on weekends to auctions in India
and Turkey and he would buy bars and things and
(12:49):
he would bring him back and and he had a
storage facility in Boston and he would bring at that time,
Polaroid pictures and he would show me, sayd where are
we going to put this? And I said, well, that
won't fit because we've already got the walls. And he said,
I tear down the walls. So it was a great
deal of fun. It was a little ridiculous. It was
(13:09):
way more expensive than it needed to be.
Speaker 1 (13:11):
For the last twelve years of Mark's career, he became
the head of the entire New England Carpenters Union.
Speaker 2 (13:18):
I got a PhD in constructionology with all those experiences
and the exposure to the issues of real estate development politics,
and because it's really what happens with construction is kind
of I think, the essence of what a community thinks
about itself, how it's going to grow, how it's going
to develop.
Speaker 1 (13:39):
But when Mark reached retirement age, he didn't just hang
up his hard helmet and pick up the golf clubs.
Even after a fifty year career, Mark was still excited
about the construction industry and he had a lot of
knowledge that he wanted to share with others, and there
were some very smart folks who were more than willing
to listen.
Speaker 2 (13:59):
I retired some years ago, sort of semi retired.
Speaker 3 (14:02):
I guess.
Speaker 2 (14:03):
And now I am a fellow at the Center for
Labor and adjust Economy at Harvard Law School, and I
use that platform to teach about labor and politics and
labor history and also to write. I've written three books
and numerous op eds articles on the topics of labor, politics, history,
(14:27):
et cetera.
Speaker 1 (14:28):
And Well, Mark didn't personally work on the buildings at Harvard,
he knows a lot of the tradesmen and women who did. Yeah,
do you ever find yourself at Harvard Law just, you know,
looking at joinery or something like that, just drifting off.
Speaker 2 (14:43):
Honestly, I do most of my work from home. I write,
and I see a lot of it as remote. So,
but you know, when I go there, the Harvard Law
School is has quite the beautiful buildings, and almost all
of those buildings were built by my friends in the trades.
Speaker 3 (15:00):
Uh.
Speaker 2 (15:01):
And I always admire the Uh. It's it's nice to
be there to be teaching in a context of an
environment that my colleagues and friends built.
Speaker 3 (15:14):
Uh. And so that sort of brings it together.
Speaker 1 (15:17):
But there are more than enough buildings all around Boston
that Mark did get to work on.
Speaker 2 (15:22):
Oh yeah, oh yeah, I mean I think everybody who
is a construction worker will go by, We'll drive around
with their kids and say, you know, daddy worked on
that or mommy worked on this, and it's it's a
standard item. Uh, you know, sort of a joke but
also a but a meaningful joke that people again, you know,
I think that's part of the satisfaction of the work
(15:45):
is that you can see that, you can point to
to a structure that you helped create, and that's that's
not a small thing.
Speaker 1 (15:55):
And if Mark Rlick's predictions of a resilient economy that
continues a long hold true, and this tool belt generation
continues to turn to the trades, hopefully in a few
years we'll have a lot more men and women driving
their children around wherever it is they live in this
country and pointing to a building, a bridge, or even
(16:18):
an Ivy League school and saying, you see that, kids,
I built that for on the job. I'm Avery Thompson
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