On your last point, in this country (UK) the gap you identify in your last paragraph was filled by men from Poland and the Baltic republics from 2008. So as our number of Universities ballooned the skills gap was filled by importing hundreds of thousands of skilled men, from the former soviet bloc in the EU. The pandemic and "brexit" reopened this gap. Now of course there is panic as the increasing prosperity in Eastern europe means many men went home and the UK seems less attractive. Of course the logical course, promoting these professions to boys and young men and training them, is closed by DEI because what we have to do is spend money promoting them to girls. A complete waste because such has failed for decades (way back in 1975 when I left school there was a huge campaign to get girls into these trades and professions under a Labour government "Rosey the rivetter" and of course this has continued since. Yet still females are a tiny proportion in the industries (and usually not in the "coal face" jobs). Result significant skills shortages!