Looking for work with purpose? Stop looking down on manual labor.

I recently had dinner with a group of friends, including the local baker, Christophe. Christophe is the creator of Du Pain et Des Idées (Bread and Other Ideas). The finest ingredients and quality baking methods are an obsession for Christophe, the result being incredible bread that Parisians will cross the city to eat.

Bread has such an important role in French culture; I was curious to know the underpinnings of the baking world and was expecting stories of pride, rigor, and esteemed masters passing the traditional recipes of France to eager, young apprentices.

It turns out that Christophe has an incredibly difficult time finding talented people to work for him. The truth is, he says, being a baker is stigmatized. Most young apprentices are there as a last resort after dropping out of school. Most young adults look down on a job that is physically hard and considered of little value.

This condescending attitude toward skilled manual labor is widespread in America, too. The value of work has shifted away from working with purpose to obtaining a mystified job title. Aspiring to a college degree, in itself a wonderful thing, has meant berating the skilled manual labor. The result is that the ranks of true craftsmen are dwindling, leaving huge holes in communities that took their goods and services for granted.

From engineering to carpentry

My talk with Christophe reminded me of so many conversations I’ve had with my dad, George. He is a carpenter in California. He studied to become an engineer at the University of Arizona. At the time, all engineers were required to do internships in construction to put their skills to use. He had a natural talent for the carpentry work, so he decided to quit his studies and become a carpenter.

He started his own framing company in California, concentrating mainly on the construction of custom homes. My dad loves his work, from constructing the plans and design with the architect to teaching his crew how to make arches out of straight planks. The ingenuity of it excites him.

The young guys my dad gets on his crews are often there because they just want to make some money. A good percentage of them are immigrants who are doing the work, apparently, that no one else wants to do. There is the occasional new recruit who comes to realize the importance of the job and his own potential. In most cases, though, the young men he hires would rather sweep the floors and go home than learn the craft of building beautiful homes.

Christophe thanks God for Japan’s interest in traditional French goods. His best apprentices are young Japanese that arrive actually excited to work at the crack of dawn and devote hours of strenuous labor to learn a traditional trade.

You're a baker?

The stigmatization of manual labor did not just begin with today’s easy-money, star-obsessed youth. When George tells someone he meets for the first time that he is a carpenter or when Anne, Christophe’s charming and dynamic Parisian wife, tells colleagues her husband is a baker, they are often met with blank stares and questioning head tilts. Most people can’t imagine why an intelligent person would want to do physical labor.

Christophe and George love their work and cannot imagine doing anything else. They are both intelligent men and thrive at what they do thanks to a steady blend of physical stamina and smarts. Society’s judgment has little weight on their self-esteem, but the fact that they have such a hard time finding people to whom they can pass on their trade is disheartening.

The continuity of their work depends on passing their skills to the next generation; otherwise, what their hands know from a lifetime of experience will be lost. They both wonder if this is the end of craftsmanship in the trades. Christophe has watched our own neighborhood lose its butcher, because he could not find a replacement when he retired.

We must value skilled manual labor

Saving our manual labor force includes abolishing the social psychological hierarchy that separates work into valued and demeaning tasks. For the individual, it means valuing gainful employment that’s useful to others. Letting young adults fulfill their dream of working in a trade is often the tangible expression of their desire to be of service to the community.

But what about the countless young workers (and immigrants) who do these jobs that are obtainable through experience instead of diplomas? What about those young adults who do not thrive in school and do not know where their passion lies? The “live your dreams” mantra sells thousands of books and a host of self-help coaches; but the truth is, not every one knows what they want to be!

These young people are in a terribly tight spot. On the one hand, school does not fit; and on the other hand, they enter a workforce (if at all) on the premise that they have already failed, hardly a motivation to perform one’s best. The work becomes a means of getting by and not an opportunity for financial independence and community involvement.

We must teach young people to value skilled manual labor again. Doing so would enhance their concept of what it means to be a citizen that contributes to the local community. And it would provide a tangible way to boost local businesses, improve the quality of services provided from these trades, and alleviate some of the uncertainty faced by young people today. The wafting smell of an expertly baked baguette can lift an entire sidewalk. Indeed, small businesses that pour passion into their products are what make a city a true neighborhood.

Cassandra Potier Watkins is a writer and author of the blog Delight. She is an American, currently living in Paris with her husband and two kids.