>Yes, but I presume at a high physical cost in the long-term?
Why? Electricians aren't doing intense labour, and I'm 99% certain that being in a job where you move around a lot (as opposed to sitting at your desk) has long term health benefits, without even getting into carpal tunnel syndrome and other RSIs associated with being at a computer.
I hire electricians regularly. Driving a grounding rod is physically demanding. Moving conduit and hoisting it overhead for long runs is demanding. Carrying tools around, mounting light fixtures…and this is for light commercial work. It’s definitely not easy on the body and why older electricians want to transition in to design and engineering as opposed to field work.
These things are relatively physically demanding if your baseline is sitting at a desk.
But hammering a rod into the ground for 15 minutes, or holding some weight over your head, or carrying weight in your toolbag are not things that break your body down; they build your body up.
I have a relative who’s a lifelong electrician, and now in his mid 60s he’s basically confined to a recliner unless he takes his pain pills. Twisting, turning, and kneeling takes its toll.
Worked for a res. Electrician for 6 years. It is often a pretty decent physical gig: drilling holes, pulling wire for days, climbing up under over every book you can think of. Someone else mentioned ground rods (relatively infrequent but), digging trenches for conduit, pulling the wire into the conduit, making up thousands of wires in boxes again and again.
Bending a 200 amp service wire around in a panel is no light task.
As someone who has never been to a gym, but has grown up on a farm and lived a life of mostly trades, it reminds me of all I see written about the different types of working out and how gym can be so different from physical labors conditions where what you are doing may not be a giant lift, or a giant use of force, but you've got to be able to do it for hours a day, back to back to back, day after day.
I'm not deluded at all. I spent a few of my younger years in the oil sands, which definitely convinced me that wasn't something I could or wanted to do forever.
But we seem to be calling anything other than "sitting at a desk doing knowledge work" physically demanding. Maybe it's me, but having physical elements of your job and the job being physically demanding are different things. And when you are out of shape, anything is demanding.
Why? Electricians aren't doing intense labour, and I'm 99% certain that being in a job where you move around a lot (as opposed to sitting at your desk) has long term health benefits, without even getting into carpal tunnel syndrome and other RSIs associated with being at a computer.