{
  "source": "Cooked Index — occupational AI risk register",
  "page": "https://cookedindex.com/jobs/bakers/",
  "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": "Bakers",
    "soc_code": "51-3011",
    "category": "Production",
    "us_employment": 236200,
    "median_annual_wage": 37160
  },
  "verdict": "EXPOSED",
  "risk_resistance": 50,
  "contested": false,
  "near_boundary": false,
  "dimensions": {
    "task_resistance": 15,
    "embodiment": 17,
    "liability_shield": 3,
    "trust_premium": 8,
    "judgment_accountability": 7
  },
  "reasoning": {
    "task_resistance": "Shaping a batard, judging when a bulk ferment is ready by how the dough slackens under your hand, scoring loaves, and pulling on color rather than on a timer are physical judgments that no text model performs — the 15 rather than 18 reflects that scaling, portioning, and depositing are already done by dividers and depositors in most commercial shops.",
    "embodiment": "You work a 3 a.m. shift on your feet in flour dust and 450°F radiant heat, hauling 50 lb flour sacks, loading deck and rack ovens, and hand-finishing product — the 17 not 20 because it's your own bakery floor, not an unpredictable outdoor or client-site environment.",
    "liability_shield": "No licence stands between you and the job: a ServSafe or state food-handler card is a class and a fee, the health inspection lands on the owner's permit, and anyone can be hired on the bench with no credential at all.",
    "trust_premium": "Wedding cakes, standing wholesale accounts, and regulars who come for your particular sourdough do build a name that follows you, but most output leaves the shop in a bag with no baker attached, which is why this sits at 8 rather than in the teens.",
    "judgment_accountability": "You adjust hydration and proof times for humidity, decide whether a batch is scrapped, and improvise on a custom order, but formulas, bake schedules, and specs are written down and the consequences of a bad call are wasted flour rather than injury or legal exposure."
  },
  "rationale": "Mixing, proofing, shaping, scoring, and judging oven color and crumb by hand and eye are not text-or-screen tasks, so language AI barely touches the core of the job. The real pressure is older and mechanical: industrial dough lines, automatic dividers, and par-baked frozen product already replaced most volume baking, and in-store bake-off means many 'baker' roles now amount to loading trays on a timer. Retail and craft bakers who decorate to order, develop recipes, and manage fermentation by feel keep the most durable ground.",
  "outlook": "Total employment holds roughly flat but continues shifting from in-house production baking to supermarket bake-off, with pay and stability concentrating in craft retail and custom decorating work.",
  "what_would_raise_it": {
    "levers": [
      {
        "dimension": "trust_premium",
        "change": "Enforceable labeling that separates scratch-baked from thaw-and-serve at point of sale — e.g. a state or municipal ordinance requiring bake-off/par-baked product to be disclosed on the menu board, analogous to France's 2015 'boulangerie' law reserving the term for on-site kneading and baking. Where consumers can see the difference, the wage premium for hand production becomes legible rather than invisible.",
        "plausibility": "plausible",
        "would_add": 4
      },
      {
        "dimension": "trust_premium",
        "change": "Continued growth of the named-baker model — CSA-style bread subscriptions, farmers-market microbakeries, single-origin/heritage-grain sourdough — where the buyer is paying for a specific person's fermentation style, not a category of bread. Already visible in US craft bakery growth and in Bread Bakers Guild of America certification signaling.",
        "plausibility": "already happening",
        "would_add": 3
      },
      {
        "dimension": "task_resistance",
        "change": "Task-mix shift as bake-off consumes the routine tier: if in-store thaw-and-bake absorbs remaining volume roles, the surviving 'baker' job concentrates into levain management, hydration adjustment for flour lot and ambient humidity, new product development, and custom decorating — the tier that resists both robotics and language models. This raises measured resistance for the remaining jobs while cutting headcount.",
        "plausibility": "already happening",
        "would_add": 3
      },
      {
        "dimension": "judgment_accountability",
        "change": "Formal ownership of food-safety and allergen calls at the production level — if FDA allergen cross-contact enforcement or a chain's insurer requires a named certified production lead to sign off on allergen segregation and gluten-free claim validation (gluten-free labeling is already an FDA-regulated claim with testing thresholds), the head baker role acquires a consequential, attributable call.",
        "plausibility": "plausible",
        "would_add": 4
      }
    ],
    "ceiling_note": "Realistic ceiling is roughly the low 60s, and it applies to a shrinking subset. The threat to bakers is not language models but a fifty-year-old supply chain: par-baked frozen product moves the skilled work to a distant industrial plant. Institutional levers (labeling laws, allergen accountability) can protect the craft segment's wage premium but cannot restore the volume roles already gone, and no licensing route exists."
  },
  "adjudication": null,
  "employment_history": {
    "points": [
      {
        "y": 2017,
        "emp": 182890,
        "wage": 25690
      },
      {
        "y": 2018,
        "emp": 180010,
        "wage": 26520
      },
      {
        "y": 2019,
        "emp": 184990,
        "wage": 27700
      },
      {
        "y": 2020,
        "emp": 168890,
        "wage": 29400
      },
      {
        "y": 2021,
        "emp": 181800,
        "wage": 29750
      },
      {
        "y": 2022,
        "emp": 205300,
        "wage": 32780
      },
      {
        "y": 2023,
        "emp": 220230,
        "wage": 34950
      },
      {
        "y": 2024,
        "emp": 231890,
        "wage": 36650
      },
      {
        "y": 2025,
        "emp": 236200,
        "wage": 37160
      }
    ],
    "from": 2017,
    "to": 2025,
    "change_pct": 29.1,
    "comparable_from": 2019,
    "spans_soc_revision": true
  },
  "pivots": [
    {
      "slug": "cooks-private-household",
      "title": "Cooks, Private Household",
      "verdict": "SAFE",
      "risk_resistance": 67,
      "median_wage": 47940,
      "overlap": 67,
      "skills_to_close": [
        "Management of Material Resources",
        "Complex Problem Solving",
        "Management of Financial Resources",
        "Persuasion"
      ]
    }
  ],
  "license": "https://cookedindex.com/terms"
}