—” hiring inexperienced workers, in this case, welders, chosen by MBA managers,”
I have been around this type of work, not in a shipyard.
The welders must have passed previous certification tests, and then a hiring test for the work being done and the usual drug test.
Each welder is assigned a stamp to physically mark their welds. Critical welds are x-rayed, others are magnafluxed...
Fail a test and you are terminated.
Some specs allow for minor repairs.
Also, inspectors visually examine every weld, and they can “look you out”.
That said, I knew one welder that made well OVER $200,000 a year and I have been retired for years, would be more today.
Doesn’t appear anymore to be like what you knew. I’ve had government contractors working with and for me for years and it has gotten nothing but steadily worse. Contractors were brought in to the gov’t workplace 30-some years ago under the reasoning that they were a better value than GSers, easier to fire for poor performance, etc. Now I see the contractors practically bribing upper managers with high paying, almost no-show management jobs after retirement to stay embedded in organizations. It’s gotten totally corrupt.
Pipeline welders are some of the best. Those pipelines go for thousands of miles and each weld must be perfect.
In Pharmacy school a friend of mine was a pipeline welder. I was a geologist. When the oilfield crashed and burned in 1983 we both went back to school to become pharmacists. His first degree was in biology. I asked him why did you do pipeline welding. He said he made about 3 times as much money welding as he could teaching biology. We were both in our mid thirties and our classmates were 20 to 25.
I was a union pipefitter/welderduring the nuclear power plant heydays. Only the best were assigned to critical piping crews. You were given 3 strikes (busted x-rays) and they pulled your pipe certifications and then transferred to hangar crew with your plate certification.
I was assigned the weld repair crew to fix the defects discovered in the x-rays. Rarely were welded pipes completely cut apart because that would require replacing 1 weld joint with short length spool piece and then you have 2 weld joints and x-rays.
I did have an experience where fraud was committed where they took my weld certification and gave it to another welder to keep him on the job. This was when I was working out of the Camden NJ local out at the Hope Creek power house.