{
  "source": "Cooked Index — occupational AI risk register",
  "page": "https://cookedindex.com/jobs/sewers-hand/",
  "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": "Sewers, Hand",
    "soc_code": "51-6051",
    "category": "Production",
    "us_employment": 2190,
    "median_annual_wage": 36480
  },
  "verdict": "EXPOSED",
  "risk_resistance": 43,
  "contested": false,
  "near_boundary": false,
  "dimensions": {
    "task_resistance": 16,
    "embodiment": 16,
    "liability_shield": 0,
    "trust_premium": 6,
    "judgment_accountability": 5
  },
  "reasoning": {
    "task_resistance": "Blind-stitching a hem so no thread shows on the face, basting a canvas front to a jacket shell, or hand-tacking a lining pleat all require reading how a specific piece of cloth is behaving under tension at that moment — no sewing automat has replicated the felt feedback of a needle passing through interlining, which is why 16 rather than a mid-band score.",
    "embodiment": "The work is entirely in the hands: pinching seam allowance, easing fullness into a sleevehead, closing a stuffed toy from the outside with a ladder stitch — but it happens seated at a bench or table in a controlled shop, not on a roof or in a trench, which keeps it at 16 rather than the high teens.",
    "liability_shield": "There is no state licence, no certification board, and no exam standing between anyone and a hand-sewing job; a mis-set button is a reject ticket at QC, not a claim against you personally, so the shield is genuinely zero rather than merely thin.",
    "trust_premium": "For the modal factory or sample-room sewer the garment ships with a brand label and no name on it, but repeat work does flow to the person the pattern-maker knows can hand-finish a specific vendor's silk without puckering — that recognition inside one shop is worth 6, not the 13+ of a bespoke tailor whose customers ask for them by name.",
    "judgment_accountability": "You are executing a spec sheet or a designer's mock-up: stitch type, spacing, and placement are set upstream, and your discretion is confined to how much ease to work into a curve or whether a piece needs re-pressing before it goes on — real skill, but not a call with consequences beyond that one unit, hence 5."
  },
  "rationale": "Hand sewing — basting seams, attaching linings and trim, sewing buttons, finishing hems, closing stuffed goods — is almost untouched by language AI, and limp-fabric manipulation remains one of robotics' hardest unsolved problems, so automation pressure per se is low. The real threat to this occupation is not AI but offshoring and the collapse of domestic apparel finishing: employment is already down to about 2,200 nationally. No licensure, little client relationship for the modal factory or sample-room sewer, and the work follows a spec someone else set.",
  "outlook": "AI will barely touch the needle work, but the occupation keeps shrinking through offshoring; the durable US jobs will be alterations, bridal, sample rooms, and restoration rather than production sewing.",
  "what_would_raise_it": {
    "levers": [
      {
        "dimension": "trust_premium",
        "change": "Enforced country-of-origin and 'hand-finished' labeling claims, plus growth of couture/bridal/heritage-brand marketing where the buyer is explicitly paying for hand pad-stitching and hand-set linings (Savile Row, Brooks Brothers-style 'hand-finished' claims; FTC Made in USA rule enforcement). If a certification scheme audits actual hand labor — analogous to Woolmark or the Handloom Mark in India — the premium becomes checkable rather than rhetorical.",
        "plausibility": "plausible",
        "would_add": 5
      },
      {
        "dimension": "task_resistance",
        "change": "Task-mix shift within the trade: if remaining domestic work concentrates in sample rooms, alterations, theatrical/costume, museum textile conservation and upholstery repair — one-off garments with no repeatable spec — the residual job is diagnosis-and-repair on unique objects rather than repetitive piecework. This is already the direction of the surviving 2,200 jobs.",
        "plausibility": "already happening",
        "would_add": 3
      },
      {
        "dimension": "judgment_accountability",
        "change": "If conservation-grade work grows, sewers in museum/archival textile roles own irreversible calls on stitch choice and material compatibility under AIC (American Institute for Conservation) treatment-documentation standards — a documented, attributable decision rather than following a spec.",
        "plausibility": "plausible",
        "would_add": 4
      }
    ],
    "ceiling_note": "liability_shield has no realistic route: there is no licensing body for hand sewing anywhere and no plausible bill creating one. Also note the score is misleading as a safety signal — this occupation's decline driver is offshoring and the collapse of domestic finishing capacity, not AI, so a high AI-resistance score does not imply job security."
  },
  "adjudication": null,
  "employment_history": {
    "points": [
      {
        "y": 2017,
        "emp": 6190,
        "wage": 26230
      },
      {
        "y": 2018,
        "emp": 5350,
        "wage": 28650
      },
      {
        "y": 2019,
        "emp": 4770,
        "wage": 29950
      },
      {
        "y": 2020,
        "emp": 3410,
        "wage": 30000
      },
      {
        "y": 2021,
        "emp": 4170,
        "wage": 29930
      },
      {
        "y": 2022,
        "emp": 3440,
        "wage": 31530
      },
      {
        "y": 2023,
        "emp": 3390,
        "wage": 32240
      },
      {
        "y": 2024,
        "emp": 2240,
        "wage": 33760
      },
      {
        "y": 2025,
        "emp": 2190,
        "wage": 36480
      }
    ],
    "from": 2017,
    "to": 2025,
    "change_pct": -64.6,
    "comparable_from": 2019,
    "spans_soc_revision": true
  },
  "pivots": [
    {
      "slug": "shoe-and-leather-workers-and-repairers",
      "title": "Shoe and Leather Workers and Repairers",
      "verdict": "EXPOSED",
      "risk_resistance": 57,
      "median_wage": 37800,
      "overlap": 85,
      "skills_to_close": [
        "Coordination",
        "Service Orientation",
        "Social Perceptiveness",
        "Operations Monitoring"
      ]
    },
    {
      "slug": "cooks-restaurant",
      "title": "Cooks, Restaurant",
      "verdict": "EXPOSED",
      "risk_resistance": 57,
      "median_wage": 37390,
      "overlap": 83,
      "skills_to_close": [
        "Coordination",
        "Critical Thinking",
        "Management of Financial Resources"
      ]
    },
    {
      "slug": "maids-and-housekeeping-cleaners",
      "title": "Maids and Housekeeping Cleaners",
      "verdict": "EXPOSED",
      "risk_resistance": 54,
      "median_wage": 35510,
      "overlap": 74,
      "skills_to_close": [
        "Service Orientation",
        "Coordination",
        "Social Perceptiveness"
      ]
    }
  ],
  "license": "https://cookedindex.com/terms"
}