The 8 lowest-paying jobs in America

Posted by Steve

July 12, 2010

I have a friend who is currently unemployed and is having a terrible time finding work. He's highly educated and intelligent with an MBA. And he's had to work some low-wage jobs just to bring in a paycheck. He's very discouraged about his job prospects. So along comes this discouraging story (via MSNBC.com) listing the "8 lowest-paying jobs in America." To me, what's discouraging about this list is that many of these jobs are on lists of projected future employment growth.

The 8 lowest-paying jobs are:

Food preparation and serving workers, including fast food (The occupation is now the fourth largest in the country with 2.7 million workers.)
Dishwashers
Cashiers (The job is No. 2 on the Bureau of Labor Statistic’s list of biggest occupations with a workforce of about 3.3 million, behind only retail sales people with 4.2 million.)
Hosts and hostesses
Amusement park attendants
Movie theater ushers, ticket takers — Paying more for movie tickets? That money's not giving these folks bigger paychecks. (The Bureau of Labor Statistics expects jobs for ushers and ticket takers to jump nearly 12 percent in the next 10 years. Woo hoo!)
Farm workers (“Job opportunities for agricultural worker occupations should be abundant because large numbers of workers leave these jobs due to their low wages and physical demands.”)
Personal and home care aides (The job opportunities in this profession are expected to skyrocket by nearly 50 percent in the next 10 years)

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