Tradie boss unleashes at younger generation and their parents: ‘Don’t want to get their hands dirty’

An Australian manufacturing boss says it has become almost impossible to hire Gen Z workers because they “don’t want to get their hands dirty.”

It comes as the Albanian government this month unveiled its plan for the future of Australian manufacturing, with a $15 billion National Reconstruction Fund designed to create jobs and diversify the economy.

Stripco Sandblasting and Powder Coating boss Paul Bucciarelli said he is struggling to find young people to work at his south-west Sydney factory.

“We are in big trouble in this country when it comes to manufacturing,” he told A Current Affair on Sunday evening.

“The problem is that in Australia there is a stigma among young people about taking a job, rolling up your sleeves and getting your hands dirty.”

The boss of Stripco Sandblasting and Powder Coating is struggling to find young workers and blames university education (photo Stripco employees)

Mr Bucciarelli said his employees are fast approaching retirement age and he is desperate to fill their jobs with a new generation of workers, but claims the task is proving to be virtually impossible.

“We need a new generation, but we haven’t been able to find it,” he said.

He blames an obsession with university education as a major reason why young people no longer want to work in the industry.

‘[There are] too many people are educated, make very little money and there is too much competition in those fields, and in others like construction and getting your hands dirty. [there are] not enough people,” Mr. Bucciarelli said.

Mr. Bucciarelli said “too many people are educated” and receive low salaries in their competitive white-collar jobs. Boss blames parents for letting kids ‘educate themselves’

Although he added that it’s “not necessarily their fault” and that parents are responsible for “pushing them to educate themselves.”

‘Society, the government [and] educational institutions trained them that way,” Mr. Bucciarelli said.

‘And [pushed] to steer them in that direction, so that they feel entitled to it.’