We use cookies to keep you signed in and to see what's working and what breaks. No advertising cookies, nothing sold. Details in our Cookie Policy.
Trade Playbook
The questions plumbers actually wrestle with aren't about pipe sizing — they're: service or new construction, residential or commercial, is the on-call worth it, and when do I stop turning wrenches and start running a business. Here's the honest version (and yes, the jokes about the job are mostly affectionate — the money is real).
Where it starts
$18–23/hr
1st-year apprentice
Where it tops out
$100k–250k+
Master Plumber / contractor
Union route
UA locals
Ontario figures for plumbing, from the first day on site to the top of the trade. Approximate, and worth checking against current collective agreement rates and job postings in your region.
| Stage | Pay | What is going on at this stage |
|---|---|---|
| 1st-year apprentice | $18–23/hr | Ontario apprentice rates step up as a % of journeyperson pay. |
| 2nd–3rd year | $24–30/hr | |
| 4th–5th year | $30–38/hr | Near-journeyperson work for less. |
| Journeyperson (306A) | $35–50/hr | ≈$70k–95k with overtime; union (UA) sits at the top with a pension. |
| Service plumber (flat-rate/commission) | Strong | Top service techs out-earn the hourly grid on commission. |
| Master Plumber / contractor | $100k–250k+ | Now it's business income, not a wage — swings with how you run the shop. |
Two plumbers with the same ticket can be twenty dollars an hour apart because they picked different work.
In and out of homes and businesses all day — diagnosing, fixing, and often selling the repair. Customer-facing, variety, and on-call rotations.
Best for: Problem-solvers who like customers and variety — and the shortest path to your own service business.
Repetitive rough-in on big projects with crews. Cleaner schedule, less customer contact, more overtime at crunch.
Best for: People who want predictable days and large-project work.
Homes, service-heavy, the easiest lane to go out on your own from.
Best for: Future owner-operators.
Process piping, institutional and high-rise, code-heavy and large-scale.
Best for: People who want complexity and the top of the pay scale.
Every figure above is what plumbers get paid. It is not what you charge once you run a plumbing business. Your rate has to carry the hours you are not on the tools, the truck, the tools themselves, WSIB, insurance, the quote you wrote and lost, and the holdback sitting in someone else's account for 60 days. Contractors who set their rate off their old hourly wage are the ones who work every weekend and still cannot say whether the year was profitable.
The step from paid by the hour to paid by the jobOff the tools, a 306A leads to service manager, estimator, project manager, plumbing inspector, instructor, or owning a service/contracting business you can eventually sell. On-call nights and crawlspaces wear on you — the plumbers who last plan the move into service management or ownership before their body forces it.
Wage data, union rate sheets, and the places plumbers talk about money openly.
The rates above are the market. The live feed is the market this week: which builders and contractors just pulled a permit or won a contract in Ontario, what they are about to need, and who to call.
Plumber Jobs in Ontario: Who Is Hiring Right NowAEC Stack handles incorporation, WSIB, insurance certificates, quoting, invoicing, and chasing the money, so a plumbing business runs like one with an office behind it.
Start your business