{
  "source": "Cooked Index — occupational AI risk register",
  "page": "https://cookedindex.com/jobs/tire-repairers-and-changers/",
  "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": "Tire Repairers and Changers",
    "soc_code": "49-3093",
    "category": "Trades",
    "us_employment": 108410,
    "median_annual_wage": 37710
  },
  "verdict": "EXPOSED",
  "risk_resistance": 49,
  "contested": false,
  "near_boundary": false,
  "dimensions": {
    "task_resistance": 16,
    "embodiment": 18,
    "liability_shield": 3,
    "trust_premium": 7,
    "judgment_accountability": 5
  },
  "reasoning": {
    "task_resistance": "Breaking a rusted bead on a 20-year-old rim, wrestling a run-flat onto a low-profile wheel, and finding a slow leak by dunking the tire in the tank are tasks no software performs — the 16 rather than 19 reflects that mount-and-balance machines, TPMS relearn tools, and road-force balancers already carry the parts of the job that used to take feel and experience.",
    "embodiment": "You work bent over in a bay or kneeling on a highway shoulder with a torque wrench, handling 80-lb truck tires, hot brake components, and 120-psi inflation cages — the 18 is for uncontrolled roadside service in rain, snow, and live traffic, short of the 20 reserved for jobs with no fixed base at all.",
    "liability_shield": "No state licenses tire changers; a shop may want TIA certification or a DOT medical card for service-truck driving, but a wheel that comes off at 70 mph becomes the shop's insurance claim and the manager's problem, not a personal license revocation, which is why this sits at 3 and not 8.",
    "trust_premium": "Regulars ask for the guy who remembers their fleet and doesn't strip lug studs, and 24-hour roadside customers remember who showed up — but tires are bought on price and wait time, and most walk-ins never learn your name, so the relationship adds 7, not 13.",
    "judgment_accountability": "Tread depth minimums, DOT date codes, patch-vs-plug rules, and manufacturer torque specs are written down and enforced; the discretion you do own — condemning a sidewall-damaged casing or refusing to remount a tire on a bent rim — is real but bounded, which is a 5 rather than a 2."
  },
  "rationale": "Nearly the whole job is physical: breaking beads, mounting and balancing tires, torquing lug nuts, patching punctures, and doing roadside service calls in weather and traffic. Language AI does not touch that work; the exposure is not automation but shop-level tooling (automated mount-and-balance machines, TPMS diagnostics that replace guesswork) and the low wages and low licensure that come with a procedure-driven role. This is a job that persists but does not command a premium.",
  "outlook": "The hands stay employed through 2035 — vehicles still ride on rubber and nobody has built a robot that can change a tire on a highway shoulder — but pay stays compressed unless you move into commercial, fleet, or diagnostic work.",
  "what_would_raise_it": {
    "levers": [
      {
        "dimension": "liability_shield",
        "change": "State adoption of a mandatory wheel-torque/retorque certification with a signed installation record, on the model of the commercial-vehicle wheel-off liability rules already enforced in Ontario and pushed by TMC/RMA guidance; if a named certified installer must sign the mounting ticket and carries personal exposure in wheel-off litigation, the shield rises from a nominal score",
        "plausibility": "plausible",
        "would_add": 5
      },
      {
        "dimension": "liability_shield",
        "change": "Insurer or fleet-contract requirement that EV and >26,000 lb GVWR tire service be performed only by a TIA-certified (ATS/CTS) technician whose credential number appears on the work order — TIA certification exists and is already contractually required by some national fleet accounts",
        "plausibility": "already happening",
        "would_add": 3
      },
      {
        "dimension": "judgment_accountability",
        "change": "Growth of the condemn/repair call as the shop's legal exposure point: RMA repair-limit criteria (no shoulder repairs, no sidewall injuries) plus DOT out-of-service inspection rules mean a technician who returns an unrepairable casing to service owns a consequential ambiguous decision; if shops formalize this as a documented sign-off rather than an informal judgment, accountability rises",
        "plausibility": "plausible",
        "would_add": 4
      },
      {
        "dimension": "embodiment",
        "change": "Task-mix shift toward mobile and roadside service (24/7 fleet ERS, run-flat and EV wheel handling at 60–80 lb, jacking on shoulders in traffic) as in-bay mounting is absorbed by automated touchless machines — the residual work is the least structured environment",
        "plausibility": "already happening",
        "would_add": 2
      },
      {
        "dimension": "task_resistance",
        "change": "Two-tier split becomes real if the remaining paid work is TPMS sensor relearn and ADAS-adjacent diagnostics, EV low-rolling-resistance and foam-lined tire handling, and nitrogen/pressure-system troubleshooting rather than bead-breaking; the routine mount tier being tooled away leaves the diagnostic tier",
        "plausibility": "plausible",
        "would_add": 2
      }
    ],
    "ceiling_note": "Even with a torque-certification regime, this stays a wage-competitive procedure role; the realistic ceiling is roughly the low 60s, and the binding constraint is that the buyer never learns the technician's name."
  },
  "adjudication": null,
  "employment_history": {
    "points": [
      {
        "y": 2017,
        "emp": 114690,
        "wage": 26710
      },
      {
        "y": 2018,
        "emp": 111620,
        "wage": 27890
      },
      {
        "y": 2019,
        "emp": 110880,
        "wage": 28640
      },
      {
        "y": 2020,
        "emp": 98560,
        "wage": 30060
      },
      {
        "y": 2021,
        "emp": 93180,
        "wage": 29580
      },
      {
        "y": 2022,
        "emp": 99980,
        "wage": 34240
      },
      {
        "y": 2023,
        "emp": 101520,
        "wage": 35790
      },
      {
        "y": 2024,
        "emp": 106620,
        "wage": 37120
      },
      {
        "y": 2025,
        "emp": 108410,
        "wage": 37710
      }
    ],
    "from": 2017,
    "to": 2025,
    "change_pct": -5.5,
    "comparable_from": 2019,
    "spans_soc_revision": true
  },
  "pivots": [
    {
      "slug": "automotive-body-and-related-repairers",
      "title": "Automotive Body and Related Repairers",
      "verdict": "EXPOSED",
      "risk_resistance": 65,
      "median_wage": 54890,
      "overlap": 80,
      "skills_to_close": [
        "Operations Analysis",
        "Programming",
        "Active Learning",
        "Equipment Selection"
      ]
    },
    {
      "slug": "automotive-glass-installers-and-repairers",
      "title": "Automotive Glass Installers and Repairers",
      "verdict": "EXPOSED",
      "risk_resistance": 61,
      "median_wage": 47630,
      "overlap": 78,
      "skills_to_close": [
        "Installation",
        "Equipment Selection",
        "Operations Analysis",
        "Science"
      ]
    },
    {
      "slug": "insulation-workers-floor-ceiling-and-wall",
      "title": "Insulation Workers, Floor, Ceiling, and Wall",
      "verdict": "EXPOSED",
      "risk_resistance": 59,
      "median_wage": 49120,
      "overlap": 73,
      "skills_to_close": [
        "Operations Analysis"
      ]
    }
  ],
  "license": "https://cookedindex.com/terms"
}