Comment by briffle
10 hours ago
I hear that argument, but a relative has been an elecrtrician that started out working mostly at the original facebook datacenter in 2016 or so. he now owns the business, and his single biggest client is still the facebook datacenter.
Constant additions, reconfigurations, etc.
How big is the business?
It's still contract work. When it's over so is your paycheck.
For a 100MW scale facility the contract work is never over. Once you are done with one bit of work something else is in need of refreshing or changing. Components are breaking daily at that scale, and switch gear, UPS, generators, breakers, etc. all have useful lifetimes and a replacement cycle.
It’s effectively a full time job for an electrician crew or three.
Of course once the facility goes away entirely the job does too. But so goes a factory or anything else.
Construction is one of the jobs that's booming nationwide.
Should still be orders different from a the continuous labor intensive manufacturing of F35's
Which is a straw man no? This thread is about building data centers, not F35s. Microsoft and FB aren’t competing against LM for land or jobs in Beaver Dam WI nor is it a zero-sum outcome, both can exist ie ‘manufacturing hubs’.