Going public with a list of the least and most stressful jobs is kind of like the Baseball Hall of Fame selection process — you won't make most people happy, but you will get their attention.
CareerCast, a job-search services firm, took that bold step recently and used a kind of complicated system for evaluating jobs, coming up with a "stress score" for the position listed.
While both lists seem plausible, CareerCast's website has been deluged with complaints (particularly referencing the high-stress list) from readers who say their job was left off and is, of course, more stressful than some of the ones on the list.
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Yes, Pete Rose should probably be in the Hall of Fame. But Don Drysdale? Questionable. Yes, being a paramedic is stressful and should probably be in the top 10. But does a PR person belong on the list? You decide. It's all so subjective, so let's just go to the lists.
Most stressful jobs:
- Enlisted military personnel
- Military general
- Firefighter
- Airline pilot
- Event coordinator
- PR person
- Senior corporate executive
- Newspaper reporter
- Police officer
- Cab driver
Least stressful jobs:
- Audiologist
- Hair stylist
- Jeweler
- Tenured university professor
- Seamstress/tailor
- Dietician
- Medical records technician
- Librarian
- Multimedia artist
- Drill press operator
Just for some reference, here are the factors CareerCast took into account when calculating the stress factor for each of the 200 jobs it considered:
- Travel (the more travel, the higher the stress)
- Growth potential (dead-end jobs tend to create more stress)
- Deadlines
- Working in the public eye
- Competitiveness within the organization
- Physical demands
- Environmental conditions
- Own life at risk
- Hazards encountered
- Meeting the public
- Life of another is at risk
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Dan Cook
Dan Cook is a journalist and communications consultant based in Portland, OR. During his journalism career he has been a reporter and editor for a variety of media companies, including American Lawyer Media, BusinessWeek, Newhouse Newspapers, Knight-Ridder, Time Inc., and Reuters. He specializes in health care and insurance related coverage for BenefitsPRO.
