CareerBuilder Job Seeker Community

News and trends

The least common jobs in America

Have you ever had a friend who claimed to be a model, but you suspected that he or she really wasn’t one? She may have had “model” listed as her job on Facebook, or he may have had dozens of glamour shots posted on ModelMayhem.com, but you never saw an actual ad campaign or commercial?

Well, your hunch was probably correct, because according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, only 1,200 people in the U.S. are employed as models.

That there are so few working models isn’t all that surprising — it’s a pretty elite industry. What is surprising, though, is how many “normal” jobs are just as hard to break into, because they are hyper-specialized or require lots of training, or because few jobs are available. According to the BLS, these 18 jobs are the least common in America.

1. Astronomers: 1,840
Average annual salary: $93,340

2. Dredge operators: 1,720
Average annual salary: $36,580

3. Model makers, wood: 1,660
Average annual salary: $28,974

4. Timing device assemblers and adjusters: 1,560
Average annual salary
: $32,300

5. Forest fire inspectors and prevention specialists: 1,530
Average annual salary: $40,200

6. Industrial-organizational psychologists: 1,420
Average annual salary: $114,040

7. Animal breeders: 1,380
Average annual salary: $35,620

8. Geographers: 1,300
Average annual salary: $72,890

9. Patternmakers, wood: 1,240
Average annual salary: $40,700

10. Locomotive firers: 1,130
Average annual salary: $47,040

11. Models: 1,020
Average annual salary: $42,560

12. Mathematical technicians: 960
Average annual salary: $49,170

13. Radio operators: 920
Average annual salary: $44,510

14. Farm labor contractors: 830
Average annual salary: $35,890

15. Fishers and related fishing workers: 700
Average annual salary: $27,880

16. Fabric menders, except garment: 690
Average annual salary: $27,370

17. Prosthodontists: 670
Average annual salary: $139,620

18. Cooks, private household: 400
Average annual salary: $31,110

What do you think about this list? Is it surprising? Let us know in the comments section.

2 comments
Ancient1
Ancient1

There are more people operating chicken cannons in the U.S. than there are models in that marketplace? Verification, please.

seethruyou
seethruyou

wow katie, locomotive firemen no longer exist as an occupation.Its a contractual term that refers to apprentice locomotive engineers.People that have firemen listed on their contract were hired prior to 1967.Railroads no longer use steam locomotives, Plus most of them will retire soon leaving your list at zero.DO NOT DO ALL RESEARCH BY COMPUTER/INTERNET!!!!!

Trackbacks

  1. [...] Standing out from the crowd doesn’t always require a booming voice or a wacky hairdo. Sometimes it can be as simple as what you do for a living. [...]

  2. [...] Standing out from the crowd doesn’t always require a booming voice or a wacky hairdo. Sometimes it can be as simple as what you do for a living. [...]

  3. [...] Standing out from the crowd doesn’t always require a booming voice or a wacky hairdo. Sometimes it can be as simple as what you do for a living. [...]

  4. [...] Standing out from the crowd doesn’t always require a booming voice or a wacky hairdo. Sometimes it can be as simple as what you do for a living. [...]

  5. [...] Standing out from the crowd doesn’t always require a booming voice or a wacky hairdo. Sometimes it can be as simple as what you do for a living. [...]

  6. [...] Standing out from the crowd doesn’t always require a booming voice or a wacky hairdo. Sometimes it can be as simple as what you do for a living. [...]

  7. [...] Standing out from the crowd doesn’t always require a booming voice or a wacky hairdo. Sometimes it can be as simple as what you do for a living. [...]

  8. [...] Standing out from the crowd doesn’t always require a booming voice or a wacky hairdo. Sometimes it can be as simple as what you do for a living. [...]

  9. [...] Standing out from the crowd doesn’t always require a booming voice or a wacky hairdo. Sometimes it can be as simple as what you do for a living. [...]

  10. [...] Standing out from the crowd doesn’t always require a booming voice or a wacky hairdo. Sometimes it can be as simple as what you do for a living. [...]

  11. [...] Standing out from the crowd doesn’t always require a booming voice or a wacky hairdo. Sometimes it can be as simple as what you do for a living. [...]

  12. [...] Standing out from the crowd doesn’t always require a booming voice or a wacky hairdo. Sometimes it can be as simple as what you do for a living. [...]

  13. [...] Posted on February 7, 2012 Filed Under Career Change, Employment, Finding a Job | Leave a Comment Before I start, allow me to draw a distinction. What I intend to talk about are not “odd jobs”— shorthand for irregular, perhaps short-term work. Rather, I want to talk about odd jobs. Have you ever watched the television show Dirty Jobs? Although I realize the intention of the show is to showcase jobs which, literally, require that one get down and “dirty,” what I enjoy most about the show is, in fact, the variation of jobs it highlights. Jobs you’d never known existed. Elephant nose-hair clipper. Human penguin. While neither of those aforementioned jobs exist (to my knowledge), I think they capture the spirit of Dirty Jobs nicely—a show which brings attention to some of the more odd and peculiar elements comprising America’s job-scape. And despite the name and its focus, I think what’s driving Mike Rowe, the show’s host, are venerable, almost democratic intentions: the show is as much about people who get dirty at work as a vehicle through which Rowe is able to examine, first-hand, the bowels (no pun intended) of Western society and reveal each and every single gear that helps to power the Modern Age. Keeping this in mind, Rowe’s object is to show—in the same way that a documentarian might—how each gear (every job in America’s job-scape), from investment banker to zoo keeper, is equal and ultimately works toward the same goal. The philosophy driving Dirty Jobs aside, I, like a lot of people (I think), am interested in odd, uncommon jobs. Not because of what they may speak to, but because of their novelty. Thus, TheWorkBuzz must have had me in mind when it recently published its list of “least common jobs in America.” [...]

  14. [...] morning, I ran into an article that reports the 18 least common careers in the [...]

Stay Connected





Subscribe