Real Deal With Ron Sivak

Podcast: Play In New Window | Download Subscribe: iTunes | Android | RSS   For the first time in its 300 year history, Mobile is buzzing as a beachhead for high-tech companies as well as emerging incubators attracting entrepreneurs in droves. That said, it was surprising to hear that the average age of skilled tradesmen - plumbers, masons, electricians and others - is nearly 50 years old. Noted from only one local contractor is that a half-billion dollar's worth of work will be stymied for them in 2016, 2017 and beyond due to a major skilled trade labor pool deficit. It may potentially hamstring significant development in both Mobile and Baldwin Counties. In this episode we talked with John White-Spunner of White-Spunner Construction and Larry Mouton with the Mobile County Public School System about the dire need to reinvigorate interest in the trades -- ignored locally for the past decade by Millennials, GenY and parents -- and revisiting the paradigm of relying on universities as the primary path to