EXPOSED
This is hands-on work — patching plaster molds, pouring and vibrating concrete, packing sand cores, trimming greenware, hand-finishing ceramic and stone pieces — and none of it is text or screen work that language AI touches. The real threat isn't AI at all: it's conventional automation, CNC mold machining, robotic pouring cells and offshoring of the high-volume tiers, which have been shrinking this occupation for decades. The modal worker follows established mold-prep and casting procedures rather than making consequential judgment calls, and no license or signature protects the role.
Mixed — a routine tier and a judgment tier. At 13 the work sits at the top of the mixed band because pouring slip, dressing mold seams, and judging when a casting has set enough to strip still require hands and a trained eye — but the repeatable high-volume tiers (identical concrete pavers, pressure-cast sanitaryware, investment shells) have already been handed to automatic pouring cells and shell-dip robots, which is what keeps it out of the 14+ range.
Hands-on in uncontrolled environments. 14 reflects a shop floor rather than a wilderness: you are lifting flasks, ramming sand, running vibrating tables, handling hot wax and caustic slurries, and working around dust and heat, but it is your own plant with fixed stations and known equipment — not a 17-plus job like line repair where the environment changes every call.
No licence, no signature requirement. 1 is near-floor because nothing in this trade requires a state licence or a personal sign-off — OSHA silica and respirator rules bind the employer, ASTM strength testing is done by the lab or the engineer of record, and a defective casting becomes the firm's warranty problem, not yours.
Anonymous artifact production. 4 sits just above anonymous because the castings leave the shop unsigned and buyers reorder on spec and price, with the small uplift reserved for the pattern-and-mold hands whose specific feel for a difficult die the plant would miss — a limit that does not apply to named studio artisans who bill on reputation.
Executes defined procedures on defined inputs. 6 puts this at the boundary of procedural work: you choose parting lines, gate placement, water-to-plaster ratios and pull times from experience, but those calls run against a shop's established mold spec and get corrected on the next pour rather than committing the employer to an irreversible high-stakes outcome.
Has AI actually changed your work?