Yesterday’s post was a gloomy one – at least if you’ve had your heart set on becoming a tiler or a floral arranger. But today’s post is more upbeat: my take on Kiplinger’s list of the top 10 go-go jobs.
Not surprisingly, most are healthcare and/or tech related. (And are all pretty well compensation positions, unlike pretty much everything on yesterday’s buggy-whip list.)
On the healthcare end, let’s give it up for the baby boomers who will be needing all that healthcare. We’re an engine for job growth! Talkin’ ‘bout my generation…Yea, us!
Projected job growth for speech pathologists is in the 20% range over the next decade. Lots of jobs, plus decent pay. (Median annual salary: $70.5K.) A lot of these jobs will be in schools, working with kids with language disorders. But a lot will be taking care of boomers with hearing loss and strokes.
Something called community service manager – who takes care of things like adult day care and meals on wheels - is also booming, thanks in part to the boomers. Treatment programs for drug users are also run by these folks. Kiplinger’s take is that we’re becoming less likely to jail drug offenders and more likely to treat them. Sounds good.
Computer systems analysts, it seem, will always be in demand. Wait until the Internet of Things takes full hold, and our smart refrigerators start communicating with our smart wristwatches to remind us to pick up some dumb old milk on the way home. If there are going to be 50 billion connected devices by 2020 – or whatever the prediction is – we’ll need more and more folks who put it all together for us. Excellent growth, and good pay. (Median: $80K)
Bette yet, become an App Developer. Mo’ better jobs. Mo’ better growth. Mo’ better salary. (Median: $92K) Thank you, Internet of Often Useless and Stupid Things. We really NEED more useless and stupid apps for our smarty-pants smartphones.
Once again, thanks to the nearing decrepitude of the boomers, RN is a growth profession – and a great one, IMHO. I’m sure that there are plenty of Nurse Ratchets out there, but during my husband’s long illness, the care we received from the many nurses we encountered at MGH was first rate.
But it you don’t have it in you to become a nurse, you can make more money and, if not keep the world safe for democracy, then keep the world’s bank accounts safe from hackers by becoming an information security analyst.(Note that demand for security analysts is being driven not by the boomers, but by cybercriminals who aren’t all that likely to be in that cohort. And here you thought that the millennials were perfect…)
Back on the healthcare front, we’re going to be needing a lot more health service managers. Someone’s got to make sure that there are enough Cling peaches and bingo cards in all those nursing homes that will be springing up.
The most rapidly growing job on the list – although by no means the largest – is that of medical sonographer, someone who takes a non-invasive look at what’s going on inside. Again, all hail the job-creating baby boomers.
When we’re not having our innards sonogrammed, or working with our speech pathologist, or eating Cling peaches at the bingo table, us boomers will be boosting demand for physical therapists and occupational therapists.
RNs with a bit more ambition may choose to become nurse practitioners or physicians’ assistants. As with our experience with RN’s, the NP’s and PA’s we worked with at MGH were remarkably helpful and compassionate. Glad there’ll be more of them around when it’s my turn.
Nothing on the list that catches your eye or interest? You can always take your chances and focus on one of those jobs in decline. Who knows, you may find your niche as a tiler who arranges flowers on the side…
What’s interesting when you do a compare and contrast of yesterday’s list with today’s is that, for the most part, the jobs that are dying out are those that require little education beyond high school. The jobs that are growing are for the more highly skilled and better educated.
Which kind of leaves you wondering what’s going to happen to those displaced. No one’s going to change from being a tiler to becoming an occupational therapist or information security analyst overnight.
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