{
  "source": "Cooked Index — occupational AI risk register",
  "page": "https://cookedindex.com/jobs/security-and-fire-alarm-systems-installers/",
  "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": "Security and Fire Alarm Systems Installers",
    "soc_code": "49-2098",
    "category": "Trades",
    "us_employment": 86340,
    "median_annual_wage": 60070
  },
  "verdict": "SAFE",
  "risk_resistance": 68,
  "contested": false,
  "near_boundary": false,
  "dimensions": {
    "task_resistance": 15,
    "embodiment": 18,
    "liability_shield": 12,
    "trust_premium": 10,
    "judgment_accountability": 13
  },
  "reasoning": {
    "task_resistance": "Fishing 18/2 through a plaster wall with no chase, drilling fire-rated top plates, and chasing an intermittent ground fault on a 60-device initiating circuit are all improvised, site-specific work; the 15 rather than 18 reflects that the design-side tasks — device layout from a floor plan, NFPA 72 spacing math, voltage-drop and standby battery sizing, panel programming templates — are now largely software-generated, so the drafting and takeoff portion of your week is genuinely compressible.",
    "embodiment": "You spend the day in attics above 120°F, on ladders and lifts at ceiling height, crawling above suspended tile in occupied buildings, and pulling wire in active construction with other trades in the way — an 18 rather than 20 only because a slice of the work is bench-level panel programming and head-end/NVR configuration you can do sitting down.",
    "liability_shield": "Fire alarm acceptance and annual inspection/test records under NFPA 72 have to be signed by a qualified person, and most states gate the work behind a low-voltage or fire alarm license with NICET Level II expected on commercial jobs — the 12 not higher because the license usually attaches to the company's contractor registration rather than your personal seal, and residential burglar-alarm and camera installs often need only a registration card or nothing at all.",
    "trust_premium": "Commercial customers and AHJ inspectors come back to the tech who knows where every device and EOL resistor in the building is, and monitoring-contract renewals ride on that continuity; the 10 stops short of higher because the work is dispatched by a central office, the homeowner signs with the brand not you, and someone else can be sent to the same panel next year.",
    "judgment_accountability": "Deciding whether a repeatedly tripping smoke is dust, a bad detector, or a real fire condition — and whether to leave a system in trouble, place it on fire watch, or notify the AHJ — is a call you make on site with life-safety consequences and no script; the 13 rather than 15+ because NFPA 72, the approved shop drawings, and the manufacturer's listing constrain most of your choices about placement, wire type, and circuit configuration."
  },
  "rationale": "The core of this job is pulling low-voltage cable through finished walls, ceilings, and attics, mounting devices, terminating panels, and troubleshooting nuisance alarms in buildings that never match the as-built drawings — none of which current robotics can do. AI does compress the paperwork tier: device schedules, battery/voltage-drop calculations, permit packages, inspection reports, and customer quotes are increasingly generated automatically. Fire alarm work carries a real regulatory moat (state low-voltage licensing, NICET certification, AHJ acceptance testing signed by a qualified person), which is thinner on the residential security-install side where the modal worker may be doing DIY-adjacent camera and sensor setups.",
  "outlook": "Demand holds or grows through 2035 as codes tighten and buildings add networked sensors; the design, quoting, and reporting hours shrink while the licensed field and inspection hours stay firmly human.",
  "what_would_raise_it": {
    "levers": [
      {
        "dimension": "liability_shield",
        "change": "States that currently exempt low-voltage security/alarm work from licensing adopting NICET Level II or equivalent as a condition of permit signoff, mirroring the fire-alarm side — e.g. a state fire marshal rule requiring the acceptance-test certificate (NFPA 72 Record of Completion) to be signed by a named certified technician personally, not just the contracting firm. Also plausible: insurers writing residential policies conditioning burglary/fire credits on installation by a licensed technician rather than self-install.",
        "plausibility": "plausible",
        "would_add": 4
      },
      {
        "dimension": "judgment_accountability",
        "change": "Codified responsibility for design decisions in retrofit: if AHJs push back on AI/software-generated device layouts and voltage-drop calcs by requiring a human technician to attest that field conditions match the submitted design (a 'field verification' line on the permit package), the installer owns the ambiguity call rather than executing a plan.",
        "plausibility": "plausible",
        "would_add": 3
      },
      {
        "dimension": "task_resistance",
        "change": "Task-mix shift is genuine here: as quoting, device schedules, permit packages and inspection reporting get generated automatically, the residual day is retrofit cable routing, nuisance-alarm root-cause troubleshooting, and integration of mismatched legacy panels — the tier that resists. Also raised if mass sensor/IoT retrofit and NFPA 72 remote-inspection rules increase the volume of commissioning and false-alarm diagnostic work per building.",
        "plausibility": "already happening",
        "would_add": 2
      },
      {
        "dimension": "trust_premium",
        "change": "Only a narrow route: commercial and institutional buyers (hospitals, schools, data centers) specifying named certified technicians in bid documents. Residential DIY-adjacent segment has no realistic path — Ring/SimpliSafe-style self-install pressure runs the other way.",
        "plausibility": "unlikely",
        "would_add": 1
      }
    ],
    "ceiling_note": "Embodiment at 18 is already near the practical ceiling; retrofit cable pulling in unmapped buildings is among the hardest remaining physical tasks, so there is nothing to add there. The real downside risk is not AI but product design — cellular, battery, self-commissioning devices shrinking install labor per site."
  },
  "adjudication": null,
  "employment_history": {
    "points": [
      {
        "y": 2017,
        "emp": 69830,
        "wage": 45670
      },
      {
        "y": 2018,
        "emp": 70900,
        "wage": 47190
      },
      {
        "y": 2019,
        "emp": 71600,
        "wage": 48970
      },
      {
        "y": 2020,
        "emp": 68920,
        "wage": 50940
      },
      {
        "y": 2021,
        "emp": 77420,
        "wage": 48320
      },
      {
        "y": 2022,
        "emp": 80720,
        "wage": 50130
      },
      {
        "y": 2023,
        "emp": 83540,
        "wage": 56430
      },
      {
        "y": 2024,
        "emp": 81510,
        "wage": 59300
      },
      {
        "y": 2025,
        "emp": 86340,
        "wage": 60070
      }
    ],
    "from": 2017,
    "to": 2025,
    "change_pct": 23.6,
    "comparable_from": 2019,
    "spans_soc_revision": true
  },
  "pivots": [],
  "license": "https://cookedindex.com/terms"
}