{ "source": "Cooked Index — occupational AI risk register", "page": "https://cookedindex.com/jobs/budget-analysts/", "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": "Budget Analysts", "soc_code": "13-2031", "category": "Business", "us_employment": 47160, "median_annual_wage": 91640 }, "verdict": "COOKED", "risk_resistance": 31, "contested": false, "near_boundary": false, "dimensions": { "task_resistance": 7, "embodiment": 2, "liability_shield": 3, "trust_premium": 8, "judgment_accountability": 11 }, "reasoning": { "task_resistance": "At 7 the score credits the parts that survive — the closed-door negotiation with a program manager who padded their request, and the interpretation of appropriation language mid-execution — but the consolidation of departmental submissions, the recurring variance report, the funds-availability check against the encumbrance ledger, and the first draft of the budget message are all reproducible from structured GL data, which is most of a fiscal-year cycle.", "embodiment": "A 2 rather than a 0 reflects that budget hearings, department walkthroughs, and end-of-quarter closing sessions put you in a room rather than at a screen, but nothing about the work requires your hands or your presence at a physical site.", "liability_shield": "CGFM or CDFM is resume decoration, not a legal precondition — no statute requires a credentialed budget analyst to certify an appropriation request, and when funds are overspent it is the agency head or the CFO who answers to the auditor and, under the Antideficiency Act, faces the reportable violation.", "trust_premium": "An 8 recognizes that program directors who trust you will bring you their real numbers early instead of a sanitized ask, and that reputation is built over years of budget cycles, but the deliverable is still a document that goes into a packet and is read by people who do not know or care who assembled it.", "judgment_accountability": "An 11 reflects genuine discretion — deciding which requests are unfundable, recommending a mid-year reduction when sales-tax receipts fall short, choosing a revenue assumption you will have to defend in a public hearing — while acknowledging that you recommend rather than decide, and the appropriation ordinance, budget instructions, and OMB Circular A-11 or equivalent fix the format and much of the substance before you start." }, "rationale": "The bulk of the job — consolidating departmental budget requests, building spreadsheet models, running variance and trend analysis, and writing the narrative justifications that accompany budget documents — is exactly the text-and-tables work current AI does at usable quality once it is wired to the ERP and general ledger. What persists is the political and adversarial layer: challenging a department head's headcount ask, defending a number in front of a city council or CFO, and owning the call when revenue assumptions break mid-year. Most budget analysts work in government, where entrenched processes, appropriation law, and civil-service structures will slow the transition considerably even though the tasks themselves are solvable.", "outlook": "Headcount shrinks meaningfully over ten years as budget consolidation and reporting automate, leaving a smaller tier of analysts who negotiate allocations and answer to boards.", "what_would_raise_it": { "levers": [ { "dimension": "judgment_accountability", "change": "If GFOA or state local-government finance statutes formalize a named 'budget officer of record' who must personally certify revenue assumptions and the balanced-budget calculation — as some states already require for county/municipal budget certification (e.g., NC's Local Government Budget and Fiscal Control Act designating a budget officer) — and that certification is extended to explicitly cover AI-generated forecasts, the role's ownership of consequential calls under ambiguity hardens rather than dissolves.", "plausibility": "plausible", "would_add": 4 }, { "dimension": "task_resistance", "change": "Genuine two-tier structure: if consolidation, variance runs, and narrative drafting are absorbed by ERP-embedded copilots (Workday Adaptive, Oracle EPM Planning already ship these), the residual job becomes adversarial negotiation with department heads, council testimony, and mid-year reforecast decisions when revenue breaks. Task_resistance rises mechanically as the routine tier leaves, no law needed — watch for job postings emphasizing 'business partnering' over model-building.", "plausibility": "already happening", "would_add": 4 }, { "dimension": "liability_shield", "change": "If GASB or state auditors issue guidance requiring documented human review and attestation of machine-generated budget estimates before adoption — analogous to the AICPA/PCAOB push on auditor use of automated tools — a signature step attaches to a named analyst. Note this is weak: the certifying official is usually the finance director or CFO, not the analyst, so the shield lands one level above.", "plausibility": "plausible", "would_add": 3 }, { "dimension": "judgment_accountability", "change": "If federal appropriations law or OMB circular guidance (A-11) is amended to prohibit sole reliance on automated tools for apportionment and anti-deficiency determinations, the Antideficiency Act's personal-liability exposure attaches to human budget staff decisions explicitly.", "plausibility": "plausible", "would_add": 2 } ], "ceiling_note": "No plausible route to a higher trust premium: budget documents are consumed by councils, boards, and OMB reviewers who care about the numbers and the accountable signer, not about whether a human drafted the narrative. Nobody pays extra for a human-authored variance report. Even with every lever above, this stays a low-60s occupation at best — the underlying work product is text and tables, and the surviving value is a political and legal role that a much smaller number of people can hold. Expect headcount compression regardless of score." }, "adjudication": null, "employment_history": { "points": [ { "y": 2017, "emp": 54550, "wage": 75240 }, { "y": 2018, "emp": 52810, "wage": 76220 }, { "y": 2019, "emp": 51460, "wage": 76540 }, { "y": 2020, "emp": 49260, "wage": 78970 }, { "y": 2021, "emp": 47440, "wage": 79940 }, { "y": 2022, "emp": 48430, "wage": 82260 }, { "y": 2023, "emp": 47310, "wage": 84940 }, { "y": 2024, "emp": 47170, "wage": 87930 }, { "y": 2025, "emp": 47160, "wage": 91640 } ], "from": 2017, "to": 2025, "change_pct": -13.5, "comparable_from": 2019, "spans_soc_revision": true }, "pivots": [ { "slug": "accountants-and-auditors", "title": "Accountants and Auditors", "verdict": "EXPOSED", "risk_resistance": 42, "median_wage": 83680, "overlap": 87, "skills_to_close": [ "Quality Control Analysis", "Service Orientation" ] }, { "slug": "financial-managers", "title": "Financial Managers", "verdict": "EXPOSED", "risk_resistance": 48, "median_wage": 166570, "overlap": 85, "skills_to_close": [ "Management of Personnel Resources", "Quality Control Analysis", "Monitoring", "Service Orientation" ] }, { "slug": "actuaries", "title": "Actuaries", "verdict": "EXPOSED", "risk_resistance": 45, "median_wage": 130000, "overlap": 80, "skills_to_close": [ "Systems Evaluation", "Quality Control Analysis", "Systems Analysis", "Operations Analysis" ] } ], "license": "https://cookedindex.com/terms" }