And they can do their work without working buildings, electricity, or plumbing! I mean, it's working fine right now, what do we even need trades for??

Shoddy or delayed construction, plumbing, or electricity is a massive drain on the economy of a country. If there is a massive shortage of workers willing to even do the work and a lack of people with a couple brain cells to rub together entering the field due to your ridiculous mindset, the innovation and everything you rely on is not possible. Also, the trades wouldn't be paying such outsized wages if there wasn't such a need for them. Your argument makes the assumption you can remove the middle levels of the scaffolding and add to the top to help a country move forward.

You lost me at saying trade school careers are causing us to be less productive. Having a good supply of competent people building and maintaining the country is a value add, not a subtraction...

Well, a lot of the time poor countries can step right up to solar since it's small and modular and requires 1000x less upfront investment compared to building out a grid.