Big Tech’s AI future relies on an unlikely hero: The blue-collar worker

We are living through some interesting times. Not even two years ago, I would have said one of the fastest-growing white-collar job industries for college graduates was Big Tech. The giants, such as Meta, Google, and Microsoft, were not at all concerned about hammers, nails, plumbers, and electricians. They were looking for degree-holders who wanted to code, program, and design. But times have changed. In the last six months, Meta, Google, and Microsoft have expanded training pipelines for plumbers, electricians, welders, pipefitters, fiber technicians, and other construction trades jobs needed to build data centers. Gone are the days when Big Tech was solely focused on white-collar workers needed to sit behind a computer all day. Now, they need the blue-collar skilled trades workers who can build and wire the massive infrastructure they need to keep screens up and running to support the new Artificial Intelligence economic revolution. Recommended Stories Courting the blue-collar workforce is a new mission for Big Tech. Our Home Builders Institute has been sounding the alarm about the impending crash into a reality without enough skilled trades workers to keep up with housing demand for over a decade. We have offered free training (and retraining for the military) and started partnering with students in middle and high schools to introduce them to the skilled trades as a possible career path. Big Tech seemingly recruited against us during these years. Now, its pivot into workforce training is the beginning of an historic shift that will have a generational impact on our education system and our workforce. In the past few months, at least $165 million in direct new commitments have been publicly disclosed by Meta and Google alone, while Microsoft has expanded nationwide labor partnerships and local data center workforce investments. This financial investment is a signal for a major shift. Soon, these efforts will mirror ours at HBI, and Big Tech will reach into schools to show the glamour and the six-figure salaries that come with their new data center jobs. Coming to a school near you will be the Big Tech speaker at Career Day, extolling the value of plumbers and welders to the well-being of society. Where the money is put down as a marker, the education system will surely follow. Meta announced America’s Workforce Academy in June 2026 with a $115 million first-year investment. Its program is designed around free training and employment pathways for blue-collar jobs — electricians, plumbers, and more — and its activity will be concentrated in Louisiana, Ohio, Indiana, and Texas, where Meta is building major AI infrastructure.Google announced $50 million in skilled trades workforce investments to prepare more than 300,000 workers across more than 20 states, and its new efforts will help build and maintain AI infrastructure and data centers. Google and Meta are putting down the marker of what will pay. They want to force the comeback of blue-collar jobs. We haven’t seen a group try this hard for skilled workers since the “We Can Do It” posters the American government put out of Rosie the Riveter during World War II to recruit women into traditionally male roles in manufacturing.At HBI, we could not be more excited to see this big shift from Big Tech. For years, our country has suffered from a lack of skilled trades in home building, as more workers retire each year than we have new students begin training to replace them. This push from Big Tech is good for us and for our home-builder needs in residential construction, which can ride the draft of their commercial construction push for data centers. WANT TO ‘AI-PROOF’ YOUR CHILDREN? STOP RAISING COPY MACHINESThe biggest risk we have now is if Big Tech’s push ends too soon, and it becomes just a flash in the pan that competes short-term with our push for skilled trades needed to build homes. We need its $165 million commitment to skilled worker training programs to be just the beginning. We need to ensure that this becomes a historic shift back into the value of the blue-collar job in America, and a new set of education standards that embrace the reality that not every American student needs four years of college. In fact, some may own six-figure businesses with only a certification in their field. If the AI economic revolution can revitalize skilled trades, we hope it continues on well past these initial 2026 investments and into 2027 and 2028. Many of us are established partners in worker training programs, and we are encouraged and ready to ride Big Tech’s newest big wave. Ed Brady is CEO of the HomeBuilders Institute.