I manage a service department so yes I am defending it. If we could sub contact all of our technicians and charge them for shop space, insurances, vehicles, and all the rest of the overhead that goes along with it I would gladly pay $50 / hour. Hell I would pay them $100 / hr and still come out better then providing them with all the benefits they are currently receiving. There are a lot of people that have no clue what all goes into their wage
In the ag industry it cost us roughly $10k a year per technician just for training. Its not as simple as people think.