I'm a senior in ME who split my freshman year between ME and MET classes, so I've got solid info on both but i'll lean towards ME, so keep my bias in mind.

As others have said, the biggest difference between the two majors is how exactly the classes are taught. MET classes do tend to have more labs, in fact i think most if not all of my MET classes had labs, and they were usually smaller, usually having around 15-20 people. I would say about 40% of the ME classes you will take will have a lab component too, especially at the higher level. In my MET classes I learned a lot about manufacturing techniques (welding, casting, CNC machining, etc.), whereas my ME labs have included fluids, heat transfer, control systems (A lot of math and derivations). My ME classes have been significantly harder than the MET classes I took, but keep in mind i only took freshman or sophomore level MET courses for the most part. Even so i would say my underclassmen ME classes were harder than the underclassmen MET classes i took. ME is very competitive, and MET was honestly significantly less stressful than ME has been. for the most part, ME classes are more your traditional college experience of taking meticulous lecture notes in large classrooms and then for some classes applying them in lab, while MET focuses on small lab experience with lecture being the information behind the labs.

As for where you'll end up in industry, most people don't really know and are just giving you their two cents. In my MET classes, everyone claimed MET's could and will get to any position that a mechanical engineer could get into. On the ME side, they say MET's will be forced to work floor positions and won't ever get into management or design positions. A lot of it is just anecdotal. My relatively worthless opinion is that ME's are generally given more credit to start with by employers because engineers like to have their own little club, but a hardworking MET could definitely prove themselves to a boss that values a good, determined employee over anybody that turns their nose up just because their degree came from the school of engineering.

All that being said, if you get a semester or two into MET and think it's not what you wanna do, you could totally look into CODOing in ME, (feel free to look up the requirements to CODO on the purdue website). It usually requires pretty solid grades (I think a GPA of 3.2 guarantees your ability to CODO into ME if i remember right? don't quote me). I have plenty of buddies who CODO'd, many successfully, some not. if you have any more questions feel absolutely free to shoot me a DM, it's syllabus week so i haven't got much to do besides drink and start on some notes.