- Essays··8 min read
The Welder, the AI Module, and a Plan Still Being Drafted
The US Department of Labor has obligated nearly $189 million in apprenticeship grants since mid-2025 — without filing the strategy document Executive Order 14277 required eighteen months ago. The arithmetic is clear: employer-sponsor acquisition costs unaddressed, pre-apprenticeship attrition at 82 per cent, and thin manufacturing sector density put the current trajectory at roughly 850,000 apprentices by 2030, not a million. The plan the law required is not written.
apprenticeshipworkforce-developmentartificial-intelligencefederal-policyRead - Essays··7 min read
13%: the upskilling number that quietly breaks the agentic AI business case
Only 13% of employees can actually work with the agents their firms are deploying. The centaur the whole thesis assumes is mostly a novice holding the reins, and AI is demolishing the training ground that produced the experts.
agentic-aiworkforce-upskillingdeliberate-practiceapprenticeshipRead