{
  "source": "Cooked Index — occupational AI risk register",
  "page": "https://cookedindex.com/jobs/crossing-guards-and-flaggers/",
  "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": "Crossing Guards and Flaggers",
    "soc_code": "33-9091",
    "category": "Protective Service",
    "us_employment": 94360,
    "median_annual_wage": 38100
  },
  "verdict": "EXPOSED",
  "risk_resistance": 59,
  "contested": false,
  "near_boundary": false,
  "dimensions": {
    "task_resistance": 15,
    "embodiment": 19,
    "liability_shield": 5,
    "trust_premium": 11,
    "judgment_accountability": 9
  },
  "reasoning": {
    "task_resistance": "Stepping into a live lane, making eye contact with a driver who is looking at their phone, and physically walking a line of children across at a gap you judged three seconds ago is not decomposable into text prompts — the 15 reflects that no software touches the core duty, while the missing points go to AFADs and portable temporary signals that already do the stop/slow function on rural two-lane paving jobs.",
    "embodiment": "You work in an uncontrolled roadway in rain, glare, and darkness, holding a paddle, wearing ANSI Class 2/3 apparel, setting and retrieving cones, and absorbing the standing-and-walking hours that put flaggers among the higher struck-by fatality rates — 19 is essentially the ceiling short of confined-space or high-angle work.",
    "liability_shield": "An ATSSA or state DOT flagger card takes a few hours in a classroom and a written test, and when a crash happens in the work zone the exposure lands on the contractor's traffic control plan, the engineer who stamped it, and the district — not on you personally, which is why this sits at 5 rather than in the licensed-professional range.",
    "trust_premium": "Parents and principals know their corner guard by name and the same drivers slow for a familiar figure, and on construction crews the foreman keeps the flagger who reads the paver's rhythm — that recurring relationship is real, but the school district can and does replace a post with a signal or a volunteer, which caps it at 11 instead of 15+.",
    "judgment_accountability": "You decide gap timing, when to hold a group back, and when to wave off a driver who is not slowing — genuine split-second discretion, but it runs inside a written traffic control plan or a fixed school-zone post with MUTCD-defined signals, so the ambiguity is narrow and momentary rather than the open-ended high-stakes calls that earn 14+."
  },
  "rationale": "Nothing about standing in a live roadway, reading driver behavior, and timing a gap for a group of second-graders is text or screen work, so language AI barely touches this job. The real threat is not an LLM but hardware and budgets: automated flagger assistance devices (AFADs), portable temporary signals, and remote-controlled traffic control already replace one or both flaggers on many work zones, and school districts cut guard posts when signals or parent volunteers can be substituted. Judgment is real but narrow, wages are low, and certification (ATSSA/state DOT flagger cards) is a paperwork requirement rather than a personal-liability license.",
  "outlook": "Flagger headcount per work zone keeps shrinking as automated flagger devices and portable signals spread, while school crossing posts persist wherever parents demand a visible adult at the corner — expect fewer positions but continued demand for certified, on-site humans.",
  "what_would_raise_it": {
    "levers": [
      {
        "dimension": "liability_shield",
        "change": "State DOT specifications or MUTCD-adopted language requiring a certified flagger to be physically present and personally responsible whenever an AFAD or portable signal is deployed (some state DOT standard specs already require an attendant within sight of each AFAD; the 11th Edition MUTCD's AFAD provisions leave attendance rules to agencies). If attendance is written as a named, certified, disciplinable role rather than 'an operator', the shield rises.",
        "plausibility": "plausible",
        "would_add": 4
      },
      {
        "dimension": "liability_shield",
        "change": "Work-zone fatality litigation or OSHA citation outcomes that attach personal certification consequences (card revocation, individual negligence findings) to the flagger of record, as opposed to citing only the contractor. ATSSA card revocation procedures with due-process teeth would be the visible marker.",
        "plausibility": "plausible",
        "would_add": 3
      },
      {
        "dimension": "trust_premium",
        "change": "School-district or municipal ordinances mandating a paid adult crossing guard at designated school crossings rather than permitting signals or volunteers — e.g. state Safe Routes to School statutes that specify staffed posts at crossings above a pedestrian-volume threshold. Parent pressure after a pedestrian death is the recurring trigger.",
        "plausibility": "already happening",
        "would_add": 4
      },
      {
        "dimension": "trust_premium",
        "change": "Union contracts (AFSCME and police-auxiliary locals represent guards in several large districts) that bar substitution of volunteers or automated devices for bargained guard posts.",
        "plausibility": "plausible",
        "would_add": 2
      },
      {
        "dimension": "judgment_accountability",
        "change": "Task-mix shift: if AFADs take the straight-line, single-lane, good-sightline closures, the remaining human-flagged work is intersections, multi-lane taper, emergency-vehicle interruption and pedestrian conflict — the calls devices cannot be certified for. Watch state DOT specs that restrict AFAD use to defined simple geometries.",
        "plausibility": "already happening",
        "would_add": 4
      },
      {
        "dimension": "judgment_accountability",
        "change": "Formal designation of a work-zone 'traffic control supervisor' duty within the flagging crew (ATSSA TCS credential) with authority to stop work, mirroring the competent-person model in trenching.",
        "plausibility": "plausible",
        "would_add": 2
      }
    ],
    "ceiling_note": "Even with all of these, wages and headcount are set by district and DOT budgets, not by the score; liability shield is capped low because certification is employer-cheap and replaceable, and a single post eliminated by a new signalized crossing removes the job regardless of judgment content."
  },
  "adjudication": null,
  "employment_history": {
    "points": [
      {
        "y": 2019,
        "emp": 84920,
        "wage": 29760
      },
      {
        "y": 2020,
        "emp": 85050,
        "wage": 30790
      },
      {
        "y": 2021,
        "emp": 82690,
        "wage": 31450
      },
      {
        "y": 2022,
        "emp": 91270,
        "wage": 33380
      },
      {
        "y": 2023,
        "emp": 90780,
        "wage": 36370
      },
      {
        "y": 2024,
        "emp": 90180,
        "wage": 37700
      },
      {
        "y": 2025,
        "emp": 94360,
        "wage": 38100
      }
    ],
    "from": 2019,
    "to": 2025,
    "change_pct": 11.1,
    "comparable_from": 2019,
    "spans_soc_revision": false
  },
  "pivots": [],
  "license": "https://cookedindex.com/terms"
}