Yes, we capitalists are hard that way. But I would also say there's another side to it, and we would hire people. From our side, the process or the mechanism isn't easy to do. It's very difficult to put a high school student into, let's say, a machine shop or things like that, with the liability to go along with it. We're now becoming more overregulated in who we have come in and all this other stuff. We have several college students, and we do hire high school students, but do you know what? Just the extra responsibility to do it and the red tape becomes an impediment. I think all of us try to do our best.
But speaking to the skilled trades issue and transition, there is a bit of an image issue, and business has to take that on. But as you saw, there are many businesses out there. I've often said to my CME peers that what we really need is the equivalent of CSI, because if you look at all the people who say, “Hey I want to do that,” you're trying to vie for their hearts and minds. The thing is, it is true that the image is a little bit tainted, but really, most people in manufacturing are running something kind of interesting, not doing drudgery.
But I'd like to speak to my friend from Quebec. Yesterday we had a peer of mine from a customer company come up--my friend Eric, who is a customer. He had to move, and again, to reinforce the point, unless businesses or governments help to attract people.... This gentleman, who was educated in a CEGEP, and his wife, who is trained as a nurse, ended up following their company down to the States. So we train these people, basically we subsidize expense, and then they follow the multinationals. That's an unfortunate burden when in fact we should be attracting people because it's sexy, interesting, and well-paying.
