Trump’s macho MAGA economy is a bust. But there are plenty of high-paying jobs for men—in nursing and teaching

The White House promised a manufacturing renaissance. Instead, the factory floor keeps shrinking. For young men willing to ditch the hard-hat fantasy, the real money is in so-called pink-collar work—and the pay is better than anything on the shop floor.

President Donald Trump built a political movement on the promise of restoring blue-collar America: steel mills humming, assembly lines roaring, working-class men back on the job. The data says something very different is happening.

The blue-collar job market has been slowing for more than a year, with jobs in manufacturing and construction racking up roughly 150,000 net losses on an annual basis as of March, per calculations by economist Joey Politano. During Trump’s first year back in the White House, the manufacturing sector alone shed 108,000 jobs—even as the administration touted a coming “manufacturing boom.” The sector most likely to have generated the jobs that replaced them? Health care and social assistance.

“There are jobs available,” Joseph Brusuelas, chief economist at accounting firm RSM, told the ...