EXPOSED
Almost nothing in this job is screen work: you're hauling tools and parts, holding conduit, cleaning equipment, disassembling machinery, and handing wrenches to a journeyworker in attics, plant floors, and crawl spaces — territory where robotics is nowhere close. The exposure is not AI doing your tasks; it's that you hold no license, sign off on nothing, and make few independent calls, so your position depends entirely on remaining a trainee pipeline into a licensed trade. Helpers who advance to apprenticeship and certification move into the 80+ safety band; helpers who stay helpers stay squeezed by crew-size and productivity pressure.
Roughly flat across the period, with year-to-year wobble.
Median pay $30,530 → $39,630 +3.8% in real terms
This line is counted by the Bureau of Labor Statistics — the one figure on this page that isn't a judgement of ours. Headcount moves on demand, offshoring, demographics and the business cycle, and automation is one term among several, often not the loudest.
So a falling line is not evidence that AI did it, and a rising one is not evidence that it won't. Both happen in this register: some occupations resist automation and shrink anyway, others are highly automatable and keep growing. The marked year is 2020.
BLS projection, 2024–2034
+2.3% 98,700 → 101,000 on the projections basis
Growing, and only partly exposed
The BLS expects +2.3% more of these jobs by 2034, and at 48/100 the work is only partly exposed — some tasks are automatable, the core of the job is not. Nothing here is in tension.
Different clocks. The score is what current AI could do to this work today. The projection is how many of these jobs will exist in 2034. Everything between the two — how fast employers actually adopt, whether demand grows in the meantime — is why they can point opposite ways without either being wrong.
~11,800 openings a year on average, including replacing people who leave.
Diver HelperCooper HelperGarage HelperRigger HelperPaint PreparerRigging HelperWet End HelperMechanic HelperRepairer HelperSalvager HelperLocksmith HelperMachinist HelperMaintenance AideBlacksmith HelperGas Fitter HelperMaintenance ClerkMillwright HelperOverhauler HelperMaintenance HelperMaintenance PersonOver Hauler HelperCar Mechanic HelperCar Repairer HelperInstallation Helper
Holding it up: embodiment . Weakest point: liability shield .
Tasks largely resist digitisation Fetching a 3/4-inch fitting from the van, torquing bolts by hand, wiping down a gearbox before reassembly, and holding a length of conduit steady while the mechanic threads it are tasks no language model touches and no commercially deployed robot performs on a live jobsite — the 16 rather than 19 reflects that the parts-lookup, work-order, and inventory paperwork side of the helper's day is already going digital.
Hands-on in uncontrolled environments Crawl spaces, attics in August, plant floors with running machinery, and ladders on uneven ground are the actual workplace, and the 18 is driven by the fact that every location is different and unscripted — short of a 20 only because some of the work happens in a fixed shop bay or maintenance room.
No licence, no signature requirement You are legally invisible on the job: the journeyworker's or master's license covers the installation, the permit is pulled in their name, and the inspector's signature never involves you — the 3 rather than 0 acknowledges OSHA 10, confined-space, or lockout/tagout cards that some employers require before you enter certain areas.
Executes defined procedures on defined inputs Your calls are bounded by what the lead tells you: which valve to close, which panel to strip, which parts to stage — the 5 covers the real but narrow discretion of stopping work when you see an energized conductor or a load that's about to shift, decisions with consequences you can name but not procedures you author.
The verdict above describes this occupation as a whole. Almost nobody does the typical version of a job — tick what's actually in your week and see how your own mix sits.
Your task mix speaks to task resistance (16/20 here) — how much of the day's work current AI already does. That is the dimension the boxes above are about.
It cannot move the other three. Liability shield (3/20) is whether the law requires a licensed human to sign. Trust premium (6/20) is whether buyers specifically pay for a person. Judgment and accountability (5/20) is whether the role exists to own consequential calls. Those are facts about the occupation's standing, not about which tasks are in your week — a paralegal who does only trial exhibits still holds no licence. Together they are 14 of this occupation's 48 points (29%).
Embodiment (18/20) is also a property of the work rather than the worker, but we don't tag individual tasks as physical or not, so the picker can't tell you anything about it. That's a limit of this tool, not a claim.
Did we get the list right? Tell us what's missing — the tasks are written from the outside, and you're reading this from the inside.
Riggers SAFE
Sheet Metal Workers SAFE
The moves above are yours to make. This is the other half: what would have to change in the world for the occupation itself to score higher. None of it is in any one person's gift, but it is where the floor actually comes from. Scores here are not a one-way ratchet. Only two of the five dimensions — task resistance and embodiment — track what machines can do. The other three track law, what buyers will pay for, and who is answerable, and those move in both directions, often in response to the same pressure AI creates. If every lever below landed, this occupation would score around 63/100, still EXPOSED.
Union or PLA language on public projects requiring documented apprentice-to-journeyworker ratios (1:1 or 1:3) as a condition of contract award — already standard in IBEW/UA agreements and in federal Registered Apprenticeship utilization requirements under some IIJA/CHIPS grant terms. This makes the helper headcount contractually mandatory rather than a cost line to trim.
Task-mix shift as parts identification, manual lookup, and diagnostic prep are absorbed by lead techs' AI tools: what remains for the helper is physical fault-finding, retrofit demolition in occupied buildings, and rigging in non-standard spaces. This raises the floor only marginally — the score is already 16 and the residual is body work, not judgment work.
State or utility rules that require a registered/indentured apprentice card for anyone touching regulated systems — e.g. gas, refrigerant, or electrical work — rather than an unlicensed 'helper' classification. EPA 608 Section 608 already bars uncertified handling of refrigerant; expanding similar named-individual requirements (e.g. state HVAC apprentice registration mandates in TX/FL, or NFPA 70E arc-flash qualified-person documentation) converts the helper slot into a credentialed one with a named person on the work record.
Formal lockout/tagout and confined-space entry roles: OSHA 1910.147 and 1910.146 require a named authorized employee and a named attendant. Where employers assign the attendant/LOTO-verifier role to the helper with documented sign-off rather than to the lead, the position acquires a consequential, personally-attributed call.
The limit. No plausible route to trust_premium: buyers contract with the licensed contractor and never select or pay extra for a specific helper. Also note the structural cap — every real lever here works by ending the helper classification (converting it to registered apprentice), not by making 'helper' safer. The occupation code itself is the exposure.
| New York-Newark-Jersey City, NY-NJ | 5,700 | $43,870 +11% |
| Houston-Pasadena-The Woodlands, TX | 4,440 | $37,470 -5% |
| Dallas-Fort Worth-Arlington, TX | 4,150 | $38,250 -3% |
| Los Angeles-Long Beach-Anaheim, CA | 2,770 | $45,190 +14% |
| San Juan-Bayamon-Caguas, PR | 1,790 | $25,200 -36% |
| Washington-Arlington-Alexandria, DC-VA-MD-WV | 1,670 | $45,260 +14% |
| Riverside-San Bernardino-Ontario, CA | 1,590 | $42,080 +6% |
| Atlanta-Sandy Springs-Roswell, GA | 1,510 | $39,130 -1% |
| Wheeling, WV-OH | 40 | $64,620 +63% |
| San Jose-Sunnyvale-Santa Clara, CA | 430 | $55,100 +39% |
| Twin Falls, ID | 70 | $51,490 +30% |
We have no reported case of a named organisation automating this occupation. Not one deployment, not one announcement.
That is worth saying out loud next to a score of 48. The verdict above is about what the work exposes — what current AI could do to these tasks. It is not a claim that anyone has done it. For this occupation those two things have come apart completely: the capability argument is on this page, and the evidence column is empty.
Has AI actually changed your work? One tap, anonymous, and the running tally is public. Nothing else is asked of you.
Rather than check back: get the digest and we'll tell you what changed — or watch a single occupation from its own page.