{
  "source": "Cooked Index — occupational AI risk register",
  "page": "https://cookedindex.com/jobs/amusement-and-recreation-attendants/",
  "methodology": "https://cookedindex.com/methodology",
  "notice": "Verdicts are re-examined as evidence accumulates. Re-fetch before relying on this; the page above always carries the current score.",
  "scored_at": "2026-08-11",
  "model": "claude-opus-5",
  "occupation": {
    "title": "Amusement and Recreation Attendants",
    "soc_code": "39-3091",
    "category": "Personal Care",
    "us_employment": 397830,
    "median_annual_wage": 32150
  },
  "verdict": "EXPOSED",
  "risk_resistance": 47,
  "contested": false,
  "near_boundary": false,
  "dimensions": {
    "task_resistance": 13,
    "embodiment": 16,
    "liability_shield": 3,
    "trust_premium": 8,
    "judgment_accountability": 7
  },
  "reasoning": {
    "task_resistance": "At 13 the split is real: physically latching a lap bar, spotting a kid who unbuckled mid-queue, and clearing a jammed bowling pinsetter resist automation entirely, but ticket sales, wristband issuance, rental checkout, and party booking — often a third or more of a shift — already run through kiosks and apps, which keeps this out of the 14-plus band.",
    "embodiment": "16 reflects a shift spent on your feet in weather, noise, and crowds — walking the load platform, hauling go-kart tires, chest-deep in a pool to reset lane lines, mopping a slide runout — in a space full of moving machinery and unpredictable children rather than a fixed workcell.",
    "liability_shield": "3 is right because no state licenses ride attendants; lifeguard or CPR cards and operator-specific ride certifications are employer requirements, not statutory ones, and when a restraint fails the state ride inspector and the operator's insurer answer for it, not the person who pushed the dispatch button.",
    "trust_premium": "8 covers the fact that regulars at a bowling alley or skating rink know their counter staff and birthday-party hosts get requested by name, but the ride you queue for is chosen for the ride — no guest picks a park because of which attendant is on the gate.",
    "judgment_accountability": "7 sits just into discretion because most of the day is checklist work — height sticks, restraint pull-tests, cycle counts — yet you personally call whether to refuse a rider, e-stop the ride, or pull an intoxicated guest, decisions made in seconds with a supervisor's radio backup rather than sole ownership."
  },
  "rationale": "The core of this job — fastening ride restraints, checking rider height, handing out skates and clubs, sweeping the midway, breaking up horseplay in a pool queue — is embodied work in a crowded, unpredictable environment that today's robotics cannot touch. What is disappearing is the transactional half: ticket booths, wristband sales, equipment checkout logs, and reservation phone calls are already being absorbed by kiosks, QR scanning, and app-based booking, which is why headcount per venue keeps drifting down. No license protects the role and pay is near minimum wage, so operators cut positions the moment a turnstile or self-serve rental locker can cover them.",
  "outlook": "The job persists because someone has to physically check the harness and pull the e-stop, but the ticketing and rental side keeps thinning, so expect fewer attendants per venue with the survivors concentrated in safety-critical ride and aquatic positions.",
  "what_would_raise_it": {
    "levers": [
      {
        "dimension": "liability_shield",
        "change": "State amusement-ride safety codes moving from 'trained' to individually credentialed and named operators — e.g. New Jersey's Carnival-Amusement Ride Safety Act operator permit regime, Pennsylvania Act 121 rules, or California DOSH permanent-ride requirements — extended so that a named, board-certified (NAARSO/AIMS/CDC-style) attendant must sign the daily restraint-check and pre-open log and is personally citable for a failure. Insurer-driven version: amusement liability carriers (a thin market since a few carriers dominate) requiring a certified, named operator per ride cluster as a condition of coverage after a high-profile restraint fatality.",
        "plausibility": "plausible",
        "would_add": 6
      },
      {
        "dimension": "liability_shield",
        "change": "Aquatic-facility rules already require certified lifeguards and Certified Pool Operators; if state health codes extend mandated ratios and named-certificate-holder-on-duty requirements to splash pads, wave features and inflatable water parks — a live topic in several state health department rulemakings after drowning clusters — the pool/waterpark slice of this SOC gains a real license floor.",
        "plausibility": "already happening",
        "would_add": 3
      },
      {
        "dimension": "task_resistance",
        "change": "Task-mix shift with no new law: once ticketing, rentals, waivers and queue management are fully kiosk/app-based, the residual job is the safety-judgment tier — deciding whether a rider's restraint seated correctly, whether a guest is impaired, whether to e-stop, crowd control during an evacuation. Headcount falls, but the surviving role scores higher on resistance. Watchable marker: job postings retitled 'ride safety operator' with certification listed as required rather than 'attendant'.",
        "plausibility": "already happening",
        "would_add": 4
      },
      {
        "dimension": "judgment_accountability",
        "change": "Operator-authority codification: state rules or ASTM F770/F2461 practice updates making the on-ride attendant's refusal-to-load and emergency-stop decision explicitly non-overridable by a supervisor or throughput system, with the decision logged under that person's credential. This converts an informal call into an owned one and is the kind of clause that appears after NTSB-style ride investigations.",
        "plausibility": "plausible",
        "would_add": 4
      }
    ],
    "ceiling_note": "Trust premium is omitted deliberately: buyers of amusement admission do not choose a venue because a human handed them skates, and there is no visible willingness-to-pay mechanism to build on. Even with full certification, this remains a near-minimum-wage role whose count per venue is set by required safety ratios rather than demand — regulation can protect the position's existence and defensibility without raising its pay or headcount."
  },
  "adjudication": null,
  "employment_history": {
    "points": [
      {
        "y": 2017,
        "emp": 310970,
        "wage": 21060
      },
      {
        "y": 2018,
        "emp": 319890,
        "wage": 22260
      },
      {
        "y": 2019,
        "emp": 338110,
        "wage": 23370
      },
      {
        "y": 2020,
        "emp": 248190,
        "wage": 24760
      },
      {
        "y": 2021,
        "emp": 262170,
        "wage": 24500
      },
      {
        "y": 2022,
        "emp": 324580,
        "wage": 27780
      },
      {
        "y": 2023,
        "emp": 361680,
        "wage": 29390
      },
      {
        "y": 2024,
        "emp": 371590,
        "wage": 30490
      },
      {
        "y": 2025,
        "emp": 397830,
        "wage": 32150
      }
    ],
    "from": 2017,
    "to": 2025,
    "change_pct": 27.9,
    "comparable_from": 2019,
    "spans_soc_revision": true
  },
  "pivots": [],
  "license": "https://cookedindex.com/terms"
}