You may have heard that newspaper reporter was ranked as one of the worst jobs in a list of 200 that were rated by CareerCast.com.
Actually, reporter was only rated at 188, not as bad as lumberjack, meter reader, taxi driver or the worst job on the list: roustabout.
Still, newspaper reporter, with an average salary score of $34,275, scored below undertaker, nuclear decontamination technologist and garbage collector. That stinks.
The CareerCast list was better than some I have seen. It took note of income, and was based on four criteria: environment, stress, physical demands and hiring outlook. Yep, you guessed it. It’s not that the work is physically difficult. Reporting drew low scores for outlook, and for income.
While that list and the low ranking received attention from reporters — a ploy to get raises? — other jobs on the list did not grab much attention. But you deserve to know where they ranked, too, to get a sense of where the (relatively) high ground in journalism might be.
These were some of the jobs I pulled out of the list that are for journalists and near-journalists, or that are interesting for comparison’s sake.
Here is my list, abridged and annotated.
1. Software engineer
2. Mathematician (Don’t even think about it.)
3. Actuary (Determines when other people on the list will die, get sick or have accidents. Helpful to job 124.)
26. Technical writer (Paid about double what news reporters get paid.)
44. Web developer (Be nice to the ones in your newsroom.)
75. Dentist
76. Barber (Why go to dental school if you work the same area and just move up one spot?)
80. Publication editor
81. Author
82. Attorney
87. Artist (Fine art)
91. Teacher’s aide
95. Sewage plant operator
96. Hotel manager (What makes sewage plant operator so similar to hotel manager?)
100. Teacher (Teachers without aides probably score lower.)
105. Advertising account executive (High stress)
113. Public relations executive
116. Piano tuner
117. Furniture upholsterer (Almost tied with piano tuner, but comes without music.)
120. Compositor/typesetter (They still have those?)
124. Undertaker (Job security not a problem.)
128. Newscaster (TV and radio)
144. Photographer
151. Nuclear decontamination technician
163. Actor
170. Advertising salesperson (TV and radio)
177. Disc jockey
178. Police officer
179. Garbage collector (Again, what makes 178 and 179 so similar?)
185. Photojournalist (Gets paid a little better than the reporter, but has to go out more.)
188. Newspaper reporter
200. Roustabout
Ratings can attract headlines (these did), but they shouldn’t drive career decisions. A rating is an artificially precise pinpoint of a dynamic and complicated reality. I have worked with reporters who rated their jobs as No. 1, but who sat next to reporters who would have agreed with the score of 188.
The secret is to make changes that raise your personal satisfaction with your career, not to follow some list. If you can engineer the right changes, your satisfaction will grow. I’m not saying your job will be as good as a mathematician’s, after all, you’re a journalist. But let’s try to be as happy as a sewage plant operator. Or at least a barber/dentist.
Career questions? E-mail Joe for an answer.
Coming Tuesday: Join a Poynter chat at 3 p.m. ET, when my guest will be Gil Asakawa, manager of student media at the University of Colorado.
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