The US Hates Builders!

Everywhere i go (in The US) it seems they hate builders. People who make things are not allowed, places to build are nil, making any noise is discouraged. Even changing your own oil is verboten in many suburban areas.

How did America get to this place? We were a nation of builders.

Now you have to make crazy money to rent a house AND a small industrial building. And small industrial buildings are not all that common. It is mostly large and mammoth buildings that are available. And they are no where near your house, so you have to drive to work, then drive home, then drive to your industrial building, if you want to build things.

Starting a small business has become so hard, that if you follow the rules, it will cost you way too much time and money to safely start your business.

In every way, the American entrepreneurial spirit has been squashed down. Snuffed out. Stifled.

City Planning

It used to be that you would have a workshop, and your home would be above it, or behind it.

The blacksmith did not live far from his smithy.
The shop keep lived above his store.

But no, we couldn't have that anymore. We needed areas for industry, and areas for residence and areas for shopping.

This might be nice in that your living areas aren't so smelly/noisy, but it means doubling the cost for each family. Twice as much land, twice as much taxes.

And even worse, you increase the time spent (wasted) for each builder as they have to travel from shop to home each day.

This was just the start of snuffing out builders.

Licensing

Licensing, or taking/stealing what used to be a natural right, and selling it back to you.

Having a builder get a contractor's license may seem honorable, and "for your safety" on the surface, but it is not. The local govern-cement is shtupid when it comes to actually building real world things. And they couldn't tell a good carpenter from a bad carpenter.

Anyone can study to pass their tests. All it measures is how much you are able to jump through hoops. I have known many good tradespeople that had to go back and "study" after failing the test. I also know many "contractors" who shouldn't have a license, but they past the test, so…

Most city inspectors are idiots. Most plan checkers are kids straight out of college. They do not have the wisdom/experience from years in the industry. But, they can tell you that you have done something wrong, and to do it over, pay more fees, crush your plans…

Where are our workspaces?

Most of the new HOAs in most of the suburban communities forbid doing anything in your garage.

What used to be a place of guys fixing cars and building things has become "only a place to park your car".

In some places, you cannot leave your garage door open. Everything has to stay spic and span. Its like a living room with plastic covers over every piece of furniture. Neat and clean, but unusable.

And with most people moving to work in white collar business, all the blue collar stuff was pushed out.

Not only can you not use your garage, you can't start a business in your house. You often have to do weird things like renting a PO Box with an actual address, and call that your business location, and then secretly do work in your house.

You most certainly cannot become a small time manufacturer in your garage. Although that is exactly what this country and the young people need. We need more jobs. We need more people starting businesses. We need more manufacturing here in this country.

Builders have been pushed out of America in every way imaginable. And the most damning is that young woman have been trained to look down on blue collar workers. If you want to discourage young men from entering a field, make it so young women will not date/marry them.

Today, there are few men in the trades. And unless we get more men in those fields, we can kiss electricity and water goodbye. Of course, more homesteads will be completely off-grid, but still a lot of people are going to be without.

We should be encouraging people to build things, but instead we put every blockage in the way. We are going to have to change that.

All images in this post are my own original creations.