10 Worst Jobs of the Future

(Related: 10 Best Jobs of the Future)

While advances in technology are driving a lot of the best jobs of the future, these advances are also driving down some of worst jobs of the future, according to a Kiplinger analysis.

“As technology has advanced, it’s allowed production processes to work more efficiently,” Kiplinger editor Stacy Rapacon told ThinkAdvisor. “A lot of low-skill jobs are being replaced by automation. The machines are able to do many things more efficiently and do them on their own. So a lot of the low-skill manufacturing jobs are disappearing.”

Kiplinger analyzed 773 occupations – focusing on the projected job growth rate for the next 10 years; historical job growth rate over the past 10 years; the current number of positions; median pay; and the typical required education – to determine which of these did not have good future prospects.

In addition to ranking the worst jobs, Kiplinger also provides suggestions for alternate career paths that utilize comparable skills or satisfy similar interests while offering better growth and pay prospects.

According to Rapacon, it’s an interesting time to look at the job market because it’s “really changing very quickly.”

“You see it affecting our economy, you see it affecting elections,” she told ThinkAdvisor. “People are losing jobs and the job market is completely evolving right now. The term people are using is ‘upskilling.’ Everybody needs to have some kind of technological know-how to work, even in these low-skill jobs now.”

The bottom of these rankings represent jobs that pay little at present and are expected to shed positions in the future.

According to Rapacon, a lot of those jobs have already suffered a lot of losses.

“People are already seeing those are not growth industries to go into. There are very few workers doing these things already,” she said.

For Kiplinger’s analysis, employment data was provided by Emsi, a labor-market research firm owned by Strada Education. Emsi collects data from dozens of federal, state and private sources, including reports from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics and surveys from the U.S. Census Bureau.

See the gallery above to find out what the worst jobs of the future are.

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