Headline risk
4%
Very Low RiskFallers
United States AI Work Index tracks this occupation on the shared structural baseline and then layers on local demand resilience, wages, and confidence.
Why This Score
Share of job tasks that overlap with current AI capabilities
Median annual wage
Projected employment change over 10 years
Typical preparation needed for this occupation
Occupation profile
Use axes or chainsaws to fell trees using knowledge of tree characteristics and cutting techniques to control direction of fall and minimize tree damage.
Task evidence
100% weighted task match · 0% effective coverage
Scores combine AI task overlap, human advantages, and local demand. How it works
United States Now
Median Wage
USD 53,900
Employment 2024
5.6K
Projected Change (2024–34)
-7.3%
Openings (2024–34)
0.7K
Wage distribution
Demand outlook
Overall employment of logging workers is projected to grow 2 percent from 2024 to 2034, decline.
Role Profile
Tasks
- 1. Stop saw engines, pull cutting bars from cuts, and run to safety as tree falls. AI use: 0%
- 2. Saw back-cuts, leaving sufficient sound wood to control direction of fall. AI use: 0%
- 3. Appraise trees for certain characteristics, such as twist, rot, and heavy limb growth, and gauge amount and direction of lean, to determine how to control the direction of a tree's fall with the least damage. AI use: 0%
- 4. Clear brush from work areas and escape routes, and cut saplings and other trees from direction of falls, using axes, chainsaws, or bulldozers. AI use: 0%
- 5. Trim off the tops and limbs of trees, using chainsaws, delimbers, or axes. AI use: 0%
- 6. Control the direction of a tree's fall by scoring cutting lines with axes, sawing undercuts along scored lines with chainsaws, knocking slabs from cuts with single-bit axes, and driving wedges. AI use: 0%
Technologies
Work context
Related
Source coverage
9/11 source families · O*NET 30.2 / OEWS 2024 / ORS 2025 / OOH 2025-08-28 / Projections 2024-34 / CPS 2025 / Anthropic task penetration
Mapping quality
title_match · employment series present
Narrative & sources
Logging workers harvest trees to provide the raw material for many consumer goods and industrial products.
Logging is physically demanding and can be dangerous. Workers spend all their time outdoors, sometimes in poor weather and often in isolated areas. Most work full time, and some work more than 40 hours per week.
Logging workers typically need a high school diploma, although some jobs do not require a formal educational credential. These workers get on-the-job training to become familiar with forest environments and to learn how to operate logging machinery.
The median annual wage for logging workers was $49,540 in May 2024.
Overall employment of logging workers is projected to grow 2 percent from 2024 to 2034, decline.
Published limitations
This page shows the local country layer, not realised individual job outcomes. The global structural baseline is shared across countries; only the local demand and wage layer changes here.
Built from O*NET occupation descriptions, task statements, technology skills, work context, Job Zones, Anthropic task penetration, BLS OEWS wages, BLS projection tables, BLS ORS requirements, BLS OOH narrative content, BLS skills data, and BLS CPS occupation age tables.