{
  "source": "Cooked Index — occupational AI risk register",
  "page": "https://cookedindex.com/jobs/public-relations-managers/",
  "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": "Public Relations Managers",
    "soc_code": "11-2032",
    "category": "Management",
    "us_employment": 74850,
    "median_annual_wage": 146910
  },
  "verdict": "EXPOSED",
  "risk_resistance": 45,
  "contested": false,
  "near_boundary": false,
  "dimensions": {
    "task_resistance": 9,
    "embodiment": 5,
    "liability_shield": 2,
    "trust_premium": 14,
    "judgment_accountability": 15
  },
  "reasoning": {
    "task_resistance": "A 9 reflects the split inside the job: drafting releases, media lists, pitch angles, coverage clips and monthly sentiment decks are now machine work, while brokering an embargo with a specific beat reporter, running a message-testing session with the exec team, and deciding what the company says at hour two of a crisis are not — so roughly half the calendar resists and half does not.",
    "embodiment": "A 5 covers the physical residue that is real but not the job: staffing press conferences, riding along on media tours, walking a camera crew through a plant, and being in the room for on-camera prep — none of it requires manual skill in an uncontrolled setting, but it does require a body in a specific place on a specific morning.",
    "liability_shield": "A 2 because nothing you issue carries a professional signature — no license to lose, no bar or board to answer to; PRSA's APR is voluntary and no employer requires it, and when a statement is legally consequential the securities lawyer or GC owns the exposure, not you.",
    "trust_premium": "A 14 recognizes that the asset is a named list of editors, producers and analysts who take your call because of prior dealings, plus the CEO's willingness to accept your read on a story before publication — that transfers with the person, not the org chart, though it stops short of 20 because much of the PR function is program management that a successor can inherit.",
    "judgment_accountability": "A 15 is earned by the calls with no playbook: respond or stay silent on a hostile investigation piece, when to disclose a breach ahead of legal deadline, whether to put the CEO on record, and how to handle a reporter who has half the story — these get made in hours, on incomplete facts, with the share price and executive careers as the downside."
  },
  "rationale": "The written output layer of PR — press releases, media pitches, talking points, coverage summaries, sentiment reports, award submissions — is exactly what generative models do at usable quality, and much of a PR manager's week is reviewing and shipping that output. What survives is the part that isn't text: owning the call on whether to respond to a hostile story, standing in front of a reporter or CEO with your name on the advice, and the personal relationships with specific journalists and editors that determine whether a pitch is read. There is no license and no legal sign-off here, so the moat is reputation and accountability rather than regulation.",
  "outlook": "Headcount thins as one manager plus AI absorbs the work of a small comms team; the surviving roles are crisis-facing, spokesperson-facing, and sit close to the CEO.",
  "what_would_raise_it": {
    "levers": [
      {
        "dimension": "task_resistance",
        "change": "Routine tier (releases, pitch drafts, coverage/sentiment reports, award submissions) is absorbed by in-house genAI, leaving crisis sequencing, litigation-adjacent messaging, and regulator/reporter negotiation as the residual day. This is a genuine two-tier occupation and the surviving tier is the judgment tier — but headcount falls as the score rises.",
        "plausibility": "already happening",
        "would_add": 4
      },
      {
        "dimension": "liability_shield",
        "change": "SEC Reg FD and Rule 10b-5 exposure for material disclosures: if enforcement actions or exchange listing rules require a named human officer to attest that an earnings release or material 8-K-adjacent statement was reviewed by a person (as securities counsel already demands for disclosure controls under SOX 302), the IR/PR manager becomes a documented sign-off in the disclosure committee chain.",
        "plausibility": "plausible",
        "would_add": 4
      },
      {
        "dimension": "liability_shield",
        "change": "FTC Endorsement Guides and state AI-disclosure laws (e.g. California AB 2013 / EU AI Act transparency duties) creating an attributable-human requirement for synthetic spokesperson content and influencer campaigns, with the agency principal named on the certification.",
        "plausibility": "plausible",
        "would_add": 2
      },
      {
        "dimension": "trust_premium",
        "change": "Newsroom and platform policies that refuse or deprioritize unattributed AI-generated pitches — e.g. wire services and major outlets requiring a named human contact and verifiable prior relationship — makes the relationship itself the billable good rather than the copy.",
        "plausibility": "already happening",
        "would_add": 3
      },
      {
        "dimension": "judgment_accountability",
        "change": "Crisis retainers written so a named individual, not the agency, is on-call for go/no-go calls during litigation, recall, or M&A windows — the pattern already used in D&O-insurer-approved crisis panels.",
        "plausibility": "plausible",
        "would_add": 3
      }
    ],
    "ceiling_note": "Even with every lever, this stays a no-license occupation: the moat is reputation, which does not scale to the 74k headcount. The most likely path is a smaller, higher-scoring profession — senior counselors rise, the release-writing tier disappears."
  },
  "adjudication": null,
  "employment_history": {
    "points": [
      {
        "y": 2021,
        "emp": 59850,
        "wage": 125780
      },
      {
        "y": 2022,
        "emp": 64280,
        "wage": 129430
      },
      {
        "y": 2023,
        "emp": 72760,
        "wage": 134760
      },
      {
        "y": 2024,
        "emp": 76060,
        "wage": 138520
      },
      {
        "y": 2025,
        "emp": 74850,
        "wage": 146910
      }
    ],
    "from": 2021,
    "to": 2025,
    "change_pct": 25.1,
    "comparable_from": 2021,
    "spans_soc_revision": false
  },
  "pivots": [],
  "license": "https://cookedindex.com/terms"
}