HVAC installation costs as much as a car in warmer regions.
General handyman work outclasses all retail jobs, but you don't hear about people with two bachelors doing that type of work like you do at a Starbucks.
A plumber might make a lot more money but they’ll never be able to shake the association with dirty, unpleasant work, despite the fact that a great deal of plumbers work in new installations for construction rather than household repair.
When I think of young and old PhDs alike, I don't think of high status individuals. I think of people who spent too long in academia. Most of them don't contribute breakthrough insights to their field in their lifetime, but rather make indentations to broader collective knowledge. That's not high status to me.
I think more highly of someone who owns their own plumbing business. An employer has more status to me because they command labor. A PhD graduate will most of the time be contributing deep narrow insight to a larger organization, not using their studies for entrepreneurial pursuits.
This is fast changing. The days of "ooh they work in an office" vs. your average handyman are mostly gone US metro areas. If anything, electricians, mechanics, carpenters, firefighters, etc. are seen as "manly men" with the surviving traditional masculinity compared to most men in metro areas.
Why would you ever consider doing that? Livable wage discussions are about what’s livable, not how much value the job provides.
But sure. Let’s tie federal minimum wage to inflation and then do local cost-of-living adjustments, say make minimum wage equal to, say, three times the typical rent for a two bedroom apartment in the area. That way places that might really struggle with $21/hour minimum wage (like Wichita, Kansas) but have low housing cost would be able to maintain adequate employment levels and attract business investment. (It would also force NIMBY-heavy communities like San Jose, California actually have to pay a consequence for extreme housing costs in the form of higher wage costs for local low-skill services… Encouraging more housing to be built.)
I'm inclined towards the skilled trade side of things because I like getting my hands dirty but I understand why people wouldn't want to do a job that has you in a shop or working out in the heat, cold, or rain on a regular basis. Not to mention I imagine the injury and/or casualty rate is much higher for many trades compared to desk jobs.
TLDR: We obviously need both and they are equally good fields but I completely understand the perceived higher valuation for the safer, less physically taxing albeit often more boring and sedimentary jobs.
I wouldn't qualify for workers compensation for my herniated disc because I don't know when it started or why. But it's probably from sitting in front of a computer. Asking coworkers over 35, they almost all have injuries from computer work.
Maintaining weight and strength while a huge chunk of your day is sedentary is a big chore too.
I'd argue the public perceives sedentary jobs as much safer because of this even if they may not be in reality.