Antonio Pedro de Lima, 54, and Naldo José Leite Lima, 50, have a few things in common. They are residents of...ParaisópolisIn the southern zone of São Paulo, the two arrived in the capital from the Northeast in search of work and a better life.
They started in the construction industry as bricklayers' assistants, did not complete elementary school, and spent much of their lives in a profession marked by physical labor. Both are also parents: Naldo has three children and Antônio has four. However, none of their children wanted to follow the same professional path.
The difference lies in the opportunities. When they arrived in São Paulo, Antônio and Naldo found in the construction industry one of the few job possibilities. Their children grew up with access to education, courses, and social projects that expanded professional options.
The topic became a controversy this year when a construction businessman complained aboutLabor Shortage.
Antônio came from Murici, Alagoas, in 1994, at 22 years old. He arrived in the city with a job promise his brother had secured for him. In the Republic, the central region, he started doing maintenance at a hotel, sanding walls and painting. Later, he worked as a bricklayer's assistant. It was there that he learned the trade that would shape his path.ItaqueraAs a bricklayer's helper, Antônio supported his four children, including Breno Tenório, 26, a marketer. Even as a child, Breno noticed his father's work routine.
In six months, I already knew a lot. That's when I started gaining this knowledge and building my own house in Paraisópolis.
Antônio, the Bricklayer
It was through his bricklayer work that Antônio supported his four children, including Breno Tenório, a 26-year-old marketer.
When we're kids, we can't fully understand these things. But I always felt his absence at home. I saw my father coming home tired and saw my father leaving in the middle of the night, still dark. I thought, 'Imagine how hard it must be to leave home at four or five in the morning.'
The same reality marked Naldo's trajectory. From Paraíba, he arrived in São Paulo in 1995, at 19 years old, to work in the construction sector, through a job arranged by his cousins. He started as an apprentice and learned the trade on the job. He dedicated more than ten years to construction, during which he also learned painting, plumbing, and electricity.
When I started, I didn't understand anything, but I learned as an apprentice. It was very demanding. Because most people from the Northeast in my time didn't have jobs beyond heavy labor. There, too, the work is heavy, but it's different. It was agriculture, on the farm.
During his construction years, bricks, concrete, stones, and bags of materials were part of his daily routine.
I carried a lot of bricks, concrete, filling floors by hand. You carry stones, carry cement, 50-kilogram bags practically. It's not easy, it demands a lot from our bodies.
Naldo, the electrician
His son, Gustavo Lira, 26, a photographer, grew up witnessing the effects of this routine.
"My father would come home tired, only having time for a bath, dinner, and sleep to wake up early again. For years, I always saw this scene," the young man shares.
Other paths
Breno watched his father build each room in the family home. Yet, he never showed interest in the trade. As a child, he would help carry bricks a few times but quickly ran away from the heavy work.
"I always ran, I never wanted to stay carrying weights," he recalls, laughing, while talking to his father.
Over time, Breno began to realize that the professional choice was also linked to the opportunities each generation had. For him, essential jobs for city functioning are still concentrated among poorer and migrant populations, while other groups have more choice possibilities.
He found another path through education. Before entering advertising college, he participated in free theater and computer courses and various social projects, which he considers fundamental to expanding his opportunities.
Today, graduated and working in communication, he looks back at his father's trajectory, who continues to work autonomously in the construction industry. Antônio had a signed contract only once, in 1999. For Breno, the cost of this work cannot be measured solely by the salary.
"And what profit do we generate from it? Considering that in parallel, we lose time with our families, we lose quality of life," he states.
Gustavo has a similar perception. He says he does not know any young people from his generation who want to follow their father's profession and attributes this choice, in part, to what he saw at home.
"Following my father, I see him today with back problems, pains. He pays for his health with the little salary he receives. The paid value does not pay for the situation he is in today," he comments.
Like Breno, Gustavo participated in courses and social projects as a teenager. These opportunities helped shape his career path in photography direction and were crucial in finding a different career choice from his father's.
The marks of work.
The construction industry left its mark on both of their bodies. Naldo now works as an electrician, a skill he learned during his years on construction sites. The experience allowed him to develop knowledge in painting, plumbing, and electricity and find other job sectors. The pains, however, persisted.
"I feel pain in my knee, when bending or climbing a ladder, and in my lower back, I imagine it's from carrying so much weight over the years," he comments.
Changing professions also didn't eliminate physical strain. As an electrician, he continues to carry materials, cables, and assemble structures.
In Antonio's case, the problems are also related to years of work. He claims that constant exposure to dust affected his lungs. Exams even revealed a dark spot that required medical monitoring.
He also bears the marks of workplace accidents. In one instance, he was on a scaffold when the structure collapsed. Approximately three and a half meters of blocks fell on him. Antonio suffered injuries to his back and head, received twelve stitches, and still bears the accident scars.
The column also became one of the main sources of pain. After spending hours bent over to lay ceramics, he says he feels the effects of the physical effort.
Are construction professionals disappearing?
The data fromNew Caged, ofMinistry of Labor and Employment, reveal a shift in the profile of the construction market in São Paulo.
Entry-level positions, such as civil construction helpers, showed a positive balance of 1,878 jobs in 2025. However, specialized roles requiring years of practical experience lost 1,895 positions.
Among workers in brick and mortar structures — a category encompassing the proper role of a bricklayer — the balance was negative, with 739 job losses. Finishing professionals also ended the year in the red, with 141 fewer positions.
Magno Borges/Agência Mural
Magno Borges/Agência Mural
Magno Borges/Agência Mural
A choice that parents desired
For Antônio and Naldo, the decrease in the number of young people interested in pursuing a career in the construction industry is not necessarily a problem. It is also a result of a generation that has gained access to opportunities they themselves did not have.
"Today, young people don't want to be masons because they have many study opportunities, right? And this work is demanding. In my time, I became a mason because I had no opportunity to study, but they are right to study and pursue other paths," Antônio states.
Naldo shares the same perspective. He says he never wanted his children to face the routine that shaped his own journey.
I never intended for them to work in this field, because it's difficult. I always tried to give them the best, but I preferred them to study, because I didn't have an education and suffered greatly because of it. Being uneducated in São Paulo was complicated. It still is.
However, Breno views his own path as something that also carries responsibility. At events, travels, or restaurants, he often thinks about his father, who dedicated his life to working on things for others, and perhaps never had access to many of these experiences.
I don't want to succeed alone. I believe my greatest dream is to be able to provide my parents with things they didn't have the chance to experience. Not because they ask for it, but because I feel they deserve it.
Gustavo also started thinking early on how to help his family. Even as a child, he noticed the financial difficulties and avoided increasing his parents' expenses.
I always understood poverty from a young age. When I was small, I didn't ask my parents for money because I knew they didn't have any. I picked up cans because I wanted to have my own money.
Today, with a profession built from the opportunities he found outside of construction, he has a goal that he considers one of the greatest dreams: to be able to provide a retirement for his father.
One of my dreams is to be able to provide a retirement for my father, so he doesn't have to work himself to death. I want to be able to give him a dignified life, so he can enjoy the rest of his life, rest, because he started working very early.
Mural AgencyThe postFrom father to son: new generations distance themselves from the profession of bricklayerApareceu primeiro em" translates to "Appeared first inAgência Mural" translates to "Mural Agency.