What Jobs will Be Good? Twenty Lasting Career Principles

The Bureau of Labor Statistics follows 340 different types of jobs, with number of 2010 American positions ranging from 1,400 (models) to 4,465,500 (retail sales workers).  It has issued forecasts for the percentage increase or decrease from 2010 to 2020, ranging from -26% (postal service workers) to +70% (home health and personal care aides). 

So what guidelines can we follow in determining from a Work's New Age perspective, beyond these numbers, which are the best and worst for the future?  Here are 20:

1. Jobs that cannot reasonably be automated away are good.
2. Jobs dependent on obsolescent or endangered technology are bad.
3. Jobs that must be done locally are good.
4. Jobs that do not include health insurance are good.
5. Jobs producing less scalable goods and services MAY be good.
6. Jobs that seem to be maximized in efficiency already are good.
7. Jobs that cater to “the 1%” are good.
8. Jobs that help people working very long hours are good.
9. Jobs related to personal travel, especially custom-designed, exotic, or expensive, MAY be good.
10. Jobs that require highly unusual sets of aptitude MAY be good.
11. Jobs in skilled trades MAY be good.
12. Jobs connected with highway, road, bridge, or airport repair, design, or construction MAY be good.
13. Jobs with artificially high or restrictive entry requirements MAY be good.
14. Jobs with a high percentage of women working them, in perception or reality, MAY be good.
15. Jobs in which Americans are particularly valued MAY be good.
16. Jobs connected with extraction are bad.
17. Jobs connected with manufacturing are bad.
18. Jobs involving showing people how to do quaternary things (nonpaying productive activities for their own sake) are good.
19. Jobs connected with health care MAY be good.
20. Jobs connected with products disproportionately likely to be used by people over 65 MAY be good.

Most of these are justified by changes in how many people are needed to produce which goods and services in America.  Others are clear outgrowths of social and political trends.  Much more information will follow, but when considering a career, figure in the above.