Ophthalmic Laboratory Technicians

Score — 32/100 resistance

Holding it up: embodiment (11/20). Weakest point: liability shield (2/20).

Five dimensions, 0–20 each, summed. Higher means more protected. The arithmetic is shown so you can check it: 10 + 11 + 2 + 4 + 5 = 32. · Scored 2026-08-11, and re-examined when evidence accumulates rather than on a schedule.

This verdict was revised after a second scoring. Two independent runs of the same rubric returned 34/100 and 30/100. The score above is their average, and the change of label held whichever way the rounding went — so it reflects the two runs genuinely disagreeing with the first published number, not a rounding artefact.

This occupation has already been through one. Headcount fell 38% between 2017 and 2025 — 30,100 to 18,660 — while the median wage held roughly flat in real terms ( -2.3% after inflation). A job being commoditised usually loses pay along with headcount. One that shrinks by half while pay holds is leaving a specialist core behind, and the score above was assigned from the occupation title without sight of that history — so it may be describing the job this used to be rather than the people still doing it. Why this is a known limit.

Confidence: high · reviewed 2026-08-11 · how scoring works

What this job involves — and which parts are yours

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.

Active moats on the surviving side: embodiment

How to future-proof this job

• Specialize in the hand-finishing tier automated labs still send out: rimless drill-mounts, wire and nylon-cord frames, and vintage/frame repair with soldering.
• Get ABO certification and move to the dispensing-optician side where you measure, fit, and adjust on live patients — that pairs the bench skill with a client-facing, sometimes state-licensed role.
• Become the person who calibrates and repairs the digital surfacing equipment and edgers; equipment-service techs get hired as bench roles disappear.
• Own remake analysis and ANSI quality sign-off for the lab, so you're the accountable inspector on the tolerance decisions rather than a machine loader.

Training paths for your skill gaps: edX — operations management and process monitoring courses free to audit · Apprenticeship.gov — industrial maintenance and millwright programs paid to train · edX — performance measurement and evaluation free to audit · OSHA Outreach Training — the 10- and 30-hour cards most employers ask for low · Apprenticeship.gov — electrical, HVAC, plumbing and fitting programs that pay while you learn paid to train · MIT OpenCourseWare — circuits, systems and diagnostic method, free and ungated free · Apprenticeship.gov — paid, employer-sponsored trade apprenticeships, searchable by trade and ZIP paid to train

All 35 skills ranked by how many jobs they open →

Where this experience transfers — occupations you could move toward

Computed from U.S. Dept. of Labor O*NET skill and knowledge profiles: high overlap with what you already do, a materially higher resistance score, no large jump in required training, and no licence you would have to start a new pipeline to get. Targets that pay meaningfully less, that are themselves COOKED, or whose own headcount is falling are excluded — a move into a shrinking trade is not an escape.

Revision history

Every change to this verdict since we started logging. Moves inside the measured noise band — three points or less — are not recorded, because re-scoring the same occupation drifts that much on its own and logging it would bury the real movements.

1. 2026-08-12 EXPOSED → COOKED 34 → 32/100

   Adjudication: scored twice independently and the runs disagreed. The change held under every rounding method, so the average was published.

Where this work is, and what it pays there

BLS metro figures for 57 areas. The verdict above does not change by city — the rubric judges what the work involves, not where it happens — but pay and headcount do, and the national median hides a very wide range.

Percentages are against this occupation's national median of $39,460. Counts are jobs in that metro, not vacancies. Metros where the BLS suppressed the cell are absent rather than shown as zero.

Who is actually doing this — nobody, on the record

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 32. 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.

Read that as a gap in the reporting we can see, not proof of absence — the dispatch runs on English-language feeds and misses plenty. If you know of a case, tell us, or add a field report from inside the job.

Quick take — do you do this job?

Has AI actually changed your work? One tap, anonymous, and the running tally is public. Nothing else is asked of you.

Self-reported and unverified — a sentiment signal, not a survey. One response per person per occupation; you can change your answer.

Field reports — what people say has changed

No field reports yet. A written account takes a paragraph rather than a tap, goes to an editor before it appears, and is the one thing on this page the rubric cannot produce on its own.