{ "source": "Cooked Index — occupational AI risk register", "page": "https://cookedindex.com/jobs/industrial-machinery-mechanics/", "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": "Industrial Machinery Mechanics", "soc_code": "49-9041", "category": "Trades", "us_employment": 439640, "median_annual_wage": 64520 }, "verdict": "SAFE", "risk_resistance": 67, "contested": false, "near_boundary": true, "dimensions": { "task_resistance": 17, "embodiment": 20, "liability_shield": 5, "trust_premium": 11, "judgment_accountability": 14 }, "reasoning": { "task_resistance": "A vibration-analysis app can flag a bad bearing, but nothing else pulls the sheave, presses in a new race, shims the motor back into alignment within 0.002\", and re-tensions the belts on a 40-year-old machine with no CAD model — that's why this sits at 17 rather than mid-band, with only the parts-catalog searching, manual lookup and CMMS entry genuinely ceded.", "embodiment": "You work inside the machine: confined-space entry into mixers and augers, LOTO on 480V panels, torching seized fasteners overhead, laying in coolant and oil on plant floors that run hot in August — there is no version of this performed from a chair, which is what 20 means.", "liability_shield": "No state licence gates industrial mechanic work; you may hold boiler, forklift, welding or refrigerant (EPA 608) tickets and OSHA 10/30, but the employer and the plant carry the liability, so the 5 reflects certifications that shape what you're allowed to touch rather than any personal legal standing.", "trust_premium": "An 11 recognizes that maintenance supervisors and production managers ask for you by name on the machines you know cold and that plant relationships travel with you to contract work — but the buyer is a company purchasing uptime, not you, and a competent replacement mechanic gets the line running too.", "judgment_accountability": "The call at 2am on whether a knocking gearbox finishes the shift or shuts down a $30k/hour line is yours with incomplete information, as is deciding that a repair is beyond safe field patching — that ownership of ambiguous, expensive, safety-adjacent calls is a 14, held below the top band because a plant engineer or OEM tech is reachable on the big capital decisions." }, "rationale": "The core of this job — crawling into a press to find a failing bearing, aligning couplings, rebuilding hydraulic cylinders, chasing an intermittent PLC fault while the line is down — is hands-on work in cramped, hot, noisy, non-standardized environments that today's robotics cannot touch. AI erodes the paperwork edges: work-order writing, parts lookup, manual interpretation, and predictive-maintenance alerts that tell you what to inspect. Diagnosis of vibration, sound, heat and slop in worn machinery, and the call on whether to patch or shut down production, stays with the human on the floor.", "outlook": "Demand holds or grows as factories add more automated equipment that still breaks in physical ways; the mechanics who add controls and reliability skills capture the wage growth, while purely mechanical generalists face flatter pay.", "what_would_raise_it": { "levers": [ { "dimension": "liability_shield", "change": "OSHA-driven expansion of formal lockout/tagout and machine-guarding sign-off: if OSHA 1910.147/1910.212 enforcement or insurer requirements evolve so that a named, certified mechanic must personally certify guard and interlock restoration after any repair (as already required in some ammonia-refrigeration PSM programs under 1910.119, where a qualified operator/mechanic signs mechanical-integrity records), the signature becomes legally load-bearing rather than clerical", "plausibility": "plausible", "would_add": 4 }, { "dimension": "liability_shield", "change": "State boiler/pressure-vessel and refrigeration codes already require licensed persons (e.g., NYC refrigeration operating engineer license, ASME/National Board R-stamp welder-mechanic certification for repairs to pressure equipment). Extension of R-stamp-style credentialed repair to more classes of powered equipment, or insurer refusal to cover claims where an uncertified party performed the repair, raises this", "plausibility": "already happening", "would_add": 3 }, { "dimension": "task_resistance", "change": "Task-mix shift is genuine here: predictive-maintenance platforms (Augury, Uptake, plant CMMS) are absorbing the routine PM-round and parts-lookup tier, leaving intermittent-fault chasing, retrofit and rebuild work — the tier where the diagnosis is ambiguous and the machine is non-standard. If PM rounds and scheduled greasing become sensor-triggered, the residual day is almost entirely judgment-tier", "plausibility": "already happening", "would_add": 2 }, { "dimension": "judgment_accountability", "change": "If plants formalize the shut-down-or-run call — a documented mechanic authority to stop a line, analogous to aviation maintenance sign-off or a union safety-stop clause in USW/UAW contracts — the call becomes an owned, recorded decision rather than an informal one", "plausibility": "plausible", "would_add": 3 }, { "dimension": "trust_premium", "change": "OEM-authorized service networks (e.g., Siemens, Fanuc, Bosch Rexroth) tying warranty validity to a named factory-certified technician; buyers then pay specifically for the credentialed human's presence to preserve coverage", "plausibility": "already happening", "would_add": 2 } ], "ceiling_note": "Embodiment is already maxed at 20 and cannot rise. Trust premium has a low ceiling: industrial buyers pay for uptime, not for humanness, and will switch to any tool that restores the line faster. The realistic headroom is in liability and formal shut-down authority, not in customer preference." }, "adjudication": { "method": "two independent runs agreed on the verdict", "outcome": "corroborated", "run_totals": [ 67, 67 ], "run_verdicts": [ "SAFE", "SAFE" ] }, "employment_history": { "points": [ { "y": 2017, "emp": 341260, "wage": 51360 }, { "y": 2018, "emp": 362440, "wage": 52340 }, { "y": 2019, "emp": 387630, "wage": 53590 }, { "y": 2020, "emp": 385980, "wage": 55490 }, { "y": 2021, "emp": 373090, "wage": 59840 }, { "y": 2022, "emp": 386120, "wage": 59830 }, { "y": 2023, "emp": 412650, "wage": 61420 }, { "y": 2024, "emp": 421940, "wage": 63760 }, { "y": 2025, "emp": 439640, "wage": 64520 } ], "from": 2017, "to": 2025, "change_pct": 28.8, "comparable_from": 2019, "spans_soc_revision": true }, "pivots": [], "license": "https://cookedindex.com/terms" }