Jensen Huang, CEO of Nvidia: “The next six-figure salary opportunities will be in plumbing and construction”
Huang expects skilled trades to see an “unprecedented” hiring boom, positioning manual labor as the biggest winner of the AI surge.
Artificial intelligence (AI) continues to reshape the labor market, driving renewed interest in skilled blue-collar trades as a path toward job stability and higher future pay.
Occupations like plumbing, construction, electrical work, and steel manufacturing could eventually out-earn today’s traditional high-paying fields in tech and finance. That is the prediction put forward by Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang. The Taiwanese-American tech mogul argued that the world is closing in on what he described as “the largest infrastructure buildout in human history.”
The surging demand for skilled tradespeople will be critical not only for building the massive data centers required to power AI, but also for maintaining them, according to Huang. “You don’t need a Ph.D. in computer science to do this. Everyone should be able to make a good living,” he argued.
This is not the first time Huang has championed skilled trades. Late last year, he predicted that AI “will wipe out 80% of office work”—a shift he believes will accelerate demand for manual labor and technical professions. At the time, he also cited carpentry and craft trades as key beneficiaries of the AI boom.
A potential shift in labor trends
Huang’s comments highlight a growing shortage of skilled workers in manual trades and a lack of generational turnover, especially as younger workers lean heavily toward college degrees and corporate office jobs. As a result, the massive infrastructure boom surrounding AI could revalue blue-collar labor and fuel a surge in demand for technical specialists.
Ultimately, constructing and operating AI data centers will require specialized hands-on labor—putting skilled tradespeople at the center of the next major economic shift.
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