Say it plainly, because it sounds counterintuitive until you think it through: the more a factory automates, the more people it needs who can fix automation when it breaks. This isn't a hopeful spin on a declining trade — it's the literal mechanism driving one of the best-paid careers in this entire network.
Median pay for electro-mechanical and mechatronics technicians — the closest BLS occupational category to this trade — is $70,760 a year (BLS, May 2024). That's the second-highest median of any trade in this network, trailing only linework, and it sits well above electrical, plumbing, and HVAC.
"Automation is taking the jobs" is only half true. It's also manufacturing a new one — the person who keeps the automation running — on a loop, forever.
Why This Isn't a Contradiction
Every robot, every PLC-controlled line, every automated conveyor and sensor array is a machine — and machines break, drift out of calibration, and need programming updates as production requirements change. None of that maintenance and troubleshooting work happens itself. The more automated equipment a plant installs, the larger the base of equipment that specifically needs a skilled human to keep it running, program it, and fix it when something goes wrong.
The Honest Growth Number
To be precise rather than overselling it: BLS projects employment of electro-mechanical and mechatronics technicians to grow just 1 percent from 2024 to 2034 — slower than the average occupation, with roughly 1,300 openings a year, most driven by workers transferring or retiring rather than net new demand. This is a genuinely small, specialized occupation (~15,000 total jobs in 2024) — not a mass-hiring trade, but a high-value, well-paid niche.
Why the Small Numbers Don't Tell the Whole Story
This narrow BLS occupational category almost certainly undercounts the trade's real footprint — many people doing genuinely automation-centric work carry job titles like "controls technician," "maintenance technician with PLC responsibilities," or "industrial electrician with automation specialization," and get counted under broader occupational codes instead. The real automation-adjacent workforce is larger than this specific category captures (the overlap with industrial maintenance, covered in full).
What It Means If You're Choosing Now
A small, well-paid, specialized trade with genuine skill scarcity rewards technicians who build real, demonstrable competency — PLC programming, robotics troubleshooting, electrical/mechanical systems integration. Entry runs through a certificate or associate degree (1 year to 2 years) rather than a multi-year apprenticeship (the full pathway), making this one of the network's faster on-ramps to its second-highest median pay.