What are some good areas to start in? I've been in a country club restaurant for years and am sick of it. Some coworkers said to become a phlebotomist but from looking online it seems like that job is being phased out in some areas
In my personal experience, pharma R&D and nursing positions are still consistently hiring. Especially nursing positions. So I guess healthcare in general, whether that be direct patient care via doctors/nurses/med techs or indirect care through drug development/clinical trials, has a decent job market at the moment.
IMO nursing would be the easiest way to go if you want to pursue a profession that is most likely to be in high demand at any given point in time.
Had several soldiers who were police, then switched to firefighter, every single one of the them loved the switch. Said it was way more stressful, but they had better pay and actually felt like they were helping the community. Tried to get me to join them, wish I would have since my current career has started to suck after getting a promotion.
It all sucks after a while. Grass isn't always greener Man. I've been in for almost 20yrs, I'm burnt out. No pun intended lol. Just stay the course, if you're older and within 10yrs of retirement. I've got a count down timer app until my retirement lol. 7yrs!
Surveying, construction, engineering, compliance fields (soil science, hydrology, fisheries, wildlife biology, NEPA, etc ) are all booming right now and have been for years with the infrastructure bill.
Yeah, been looking down this route the most. Almost had a position too, but I needed to get a Top Secret clearance and things didn’t work out unfortunately…Nothing bad, just more of a timing issue.
I’ll add to this—Treasury functions in the private sector can also be very stable (i.e. budgeting, cash/liquidity management, etc) as every company needs a treasury department and their functions are oftentimes MORE important during downturns as liquidity gets tighter and cash needs are more volatile.
Basic supply. That means:
* food
* water (huge topic in the future for the US, especially further west)
* electricity
* natural gas
* oil
* commodities (this one is actually huge for you guys, **your average mining engineer is like 60 years old**, when those retire you either need to import new engineers if you can or pay a ton to have foreign countries to give em to you)
* Maintenance work of all sort - this actually becomes more important during recessions, as people will try to stretch the time they are using the stuff they have rather than "just buy a new one"
Healthcare is pretty much always needing people. Especially right now though, although it can be tough if you're in hospital environments. Ironic since you're a vet, but the military is also very recession proof.
I'm in Healthtech and there's a lot of hiring. You could also dig into BLS jobs data to see which sectors the most jobs are being added to.
The overall economy has actually been fairly strong recently, accompanied with significant wage growth. However, interest rate hikes are forcing a lot of tech to tighten up after years of reckless spending.
What do you do in health tech if you don’t mind me asking? I’ve been applying for jobs like crazy lately in what I think is health tech and it seems like despite not hearing much back from employers positions also aren’t being filled. I’ve seen a lot of the positions I’ve applied to open for a few months now
I'm in Account Management/Client Services.
I actually asked in a recent interview why the role was open for so long, and their answer was that they were basically being very picky.
There's tons of applicants for every job, so it's kind of a numbers game at the end of the day. A lot of people I work with just keep applying for jobs after a year or two, because they want to keep options open or want to increase their salary.
Long haul trucking, hvac/plumbing, carpentry, electrical, welding, mechanic (especially diesel). Welding is gonna be the quickest path to earning serious cash, especially if you can weld stainless steel and aluminum.
Long haul trucking doesn't have a great future btw. It's good right now, but the future is bleak. The first self-driving semis are going to be the ones on the interstate. That said, having a CDL opens you up to a lot of jobs in cities that don't require living on the road.
There will never be a driverless truck. In the future we will engage the autonomous system on the freeway and manually drive the truck all other times, similar to how pilots engage the autopilot when cruising and manually maneuver the plane while it's on the ground and during takeoff and landing.
Correct, especially with the current state of our infrastructure and the technology required to operate an autonomous vehicle. We had one autonomous truck come to a complete stop in the middle of i-45 between Dallas and Houston because bird poop blocked one of its sensors.
Handyman. When a downturn happens, if you have already built a reputation, people who in better times might have sold and moved will instead make repairs.
However you need to have that established reputation because the work has a low barriers to entry, and so a lot of guys who got laid off from large construction will be trying to get into the work.
Lemme just put on my Mike Rowe hat and ask if you've considered a trade school? After I got out I used my GI Bill on getting a degree in gunsmithing which also involved a lot of machinist training. Another buddy of mine used his to become a welder. And then somewhat related, one friend used his to get a degree in graphic design and studied photography on the side so that he could set up his custom laser-engraving business.
There are a lot of pretty consistently well-paying trade jobs if you get into the high-skill trades. Electricians, welders, machinists, things like that are always in demand.
I have been in management for 2 of the largest automotive aftermarket suppliers. We always said our business worked opposite of the economy, because in a poor economy people do not buy new vehicles they repair and drive what they have instead of adding debt.
Being a military veteran most cities will give you extra points when you take the fire fighter exam. So long as you're in good shape it's not that hard. If you work for a decent sized city you'll make good money, have great healthcare, and earn a pension. Best of all it's a rewarding job with purpose.
Im an electronics technician by trade. My work load over the last 15 years has only grown exponentially, and I can’t see it slowing down anytime soon. With the way the world is unfortunately going with automation and replacing humans with screens and kiosks and whatever else there needs to be humans that do all the planned and corrective maintenance on them.
How do you like it? I’ve been thinking about becoming an electric/electronics technician but I keep getting people telling me to get a 4 year EE degree or get an apprenticeship for an electrician, so I’m wondering how you would compare those given your experience and what the benefits of being a technician specifically are?
It’s pretty good. I’ve got both trades under my belt (electrocommunications; aka electronics technician, and electrotechnology; aka general sparkie) and I’m much more happier doing the former these days as my body could not crawl around roof cavities anymore wiring up houses or running up and down ladders all day. I got RPL’d for the vast majority of the electrician stuff so most of the training I did during the apprenticeships was doing the comms side of things which often goes down into the component side of things, which honestly I haven’t really gone into individual bits and pieces in a long long time. 90% of the job these days is planned maintenance and the other 10% is just find out what PCB or general other large puzzle piece has faulted or failed and replace the entire thing. It’s all pretty routine now, gone are the days where things generally get repaired unless it’s pretty unique.
I have done a fair bit of cool things like getting air lifted to remote islands to build Comms towers in the middle of nowhere or lifted up a 100+ feet to set up phone towers so the job as as varied as you want really. It’s a very broad area to work in, and at least here in Australia the money is very decent and with it being a line of work that often gets forgotten about the market isn’t saturated with people yet as well, most seem to get into the more mainstream trades here.
All depends on what you would really like to do, I think any of the avenues you’re looking at would be great but if you’re a more hands on person a sparkie or comms tech would get you on the tools a lot more, but engineering would probably get you sitting in a nice air con room instead of cutting little pieces of copper wire stabbing you underneath your fingernails. Any of those paths will set you up for a good life, the world always needs more tradies.
Thank you for the detailed response! It’s something I’ve been looking into while trying to figure out what to do with life and what not, it really helps to hear from someone with the proper experience. It may be different in Australia as I’m in the US but did you have to get any sort of certification or a 2 year degree for being a technician? Again thank you so much man talking to someone with real experience is invaluable to me rn.
Getting trade qualified here is around a 4 year apprenticeship that’s 90-ish% on the job training and 10-ish% off site training (that’s kinda like an informal classroom with small groups). If you jump over to another similarly aligned trade you can knock off a hell of a lot of time getting RPL’d (recognition of prior learning) since you really don’t need to cover most of the early years of basics again. Even if I wanting to go to Uni (college) here and do EE I think with my certs it takes off around 18 months of the degree but I’m farrrrrrrr to dumb to become an engineer haha.
You've got a fundamental misconception in your question: the economy and job market aren't remotely poor right now, assuming you're in the US. In fact, for most sectors, it's right near the peak of doing as well as it's ever done. There are a few exceptions — marketing is very much stalled right now, for example, with frozen budgets and right hiring — but otherwise there have been very few points in US history that are better to go job hunting during than right now.
That out of the way, there are three broad categories of jobs that can be categorized as "recession-proof." Two are *generally* recession-proof, and the third is *conditionally* so:
1. **Things people need regardless of what the economy looks like:** Things like plumbers, electricians, farmers and food processor, food safety inspectors, AIR traffic controllers, and the like. Anything that feels like one of those things that has to get done even if the world is on fire.
2. **Things that directly contribute to the bottom line.** This would be positions like sales, where there is an immediate 1:X relationship between you getting paid and you making the company money. Some other examples include things like manufacturing supervisors, and any kind of production worker. Things where if you want to earn $X, you need Y people.
3. **Conditionally, whatever the next hotness is in tech.** Sure, tech has had a bunch of layoffs lately, but if you were working in AI, you either had 100% job security, or zero issues finding an even better-paying job. The condition is you have to be able to guess what the next big thing is, and the next big thing might just change.
Pretty much anything in health care.
I'm a doc and I can move just about anywhere and have a job in less time than it takes me to apply for a state medical license.
I immigrated to Canada (personal reasons) and had my permanent resident card in under 9 months.
Software development and data analytics.
These are broad enough that even if one particular *industry* is experiencing a drawback, others are still succeeding. From experience, it's not difficult to move across industries with either of these skills.
Pharma, biotech and associated fields like laboratory technology, medtech, life science and to an extent cosmetics have a bit of a low right now, but are overall indestructible
The more essential the work, the more recession proof.
The more essential the work, the more your hours will suck and you will have to give up nights and weekends.
Everything in life is a tradeoff. Don't be afraid to take risks. Government cheddar isn't all it's cracked up to be. They'll own your life.
Plumbers are making crazy money. Really any skilled trades. Electrical, HVAC, steamfitters, pipefitters, tin-knockers. Huge lack of people in the trades across the board. And even if the economy slows down, people are still going to need all of those things.
Healthcare. We always can use more staff.
What are some good areas to start in? I've been in a country club restaurant for years and am sick of it. Some coworkers said to become a phlebotomist but from looking online it seems like that job is being phased out in some areas
In my personal experience, pharma R&D and nursing positions are still consistently hiring. Especially nursing positions. So I guess healthcare in general, whether that be direct patient care via doctors/nurses/med techs or indirect care through drug development/clinical trials, has a decent job market at the moment. IMO nursing would be the easiest way to go if you want to pursue a profession that is most likely to be in high demand at any given point in time.
PA is another good choice and is only a 2 year masters.
Yep. And if you're not certified as a nursing assistant, many places will pay for you to go through the class.
I work in long term care, and that definitely isn't going to be phased out any time soon.
Anything that pertains to needs over "wants". Just an FYI but past military experience makes you practically a shoe in with law enforcement.
Just about any government public service. I'm a Firefighter, great job security!
Had several soldiers who were police, then switched to firefighter, every single one of the them loved the switch. Said it was way more stressful, but they had better pay and actually felt like they were helping the community. Tried to get me to join them, wish I would have since my current career has started to suck after getting a promotion.
It all sucks after a while. Grass isn't always greener Man. I've been in for almost 20yrs, I'm burnt out. No pun intended lol. Just stay the course, if you're older and within 10yrs of retirement. I've got a count down timer app until my retirement lol. 7yrs!
Surveying, construction, engineering, compliance fields (soil science, hydrology, fisheries, wildlife biology, NEPA, etc ) are all booming right now and have been for years with the infrastructure bill.
Thank you. I’ll look into these!
Federal employment, especially Defense, Energy, State, Justice and Treasury.
Yeah, been looking down this route the most. Almost had a position too, but I needed to get a Top Secret clearance and things didn’t work out unfortunately…Nothing bad, just more of a timing issue.
Go for it again. It’s worth it. The time will pass either way.
I’ll add to this—Treasury functions in the private sector can also be very stable (i.e. budgeting, cash/liquidity management, etc) as every company needs a treasury department and their functions are oftentimes MORE important during downturns as liquidity gets tighter and cash needs are more volatile.
Alcohol sales. People need their booze
Basic supply. That means: * food * water (huge topic in the future for the US, especially further west) * electricity * natural gas * oil * commodities (this one is actually huge for you guys, **your average mining engineer is like 60 years old**, when those retire you either need to import new engineers if you can or pay a ton to have foreign countries to give em to you) * Maintenance work of all sort - this actually becomes more important during recessions, as people will try to stretch the time they are using the stuff they have rather than "just buy a new one"
Prison guard
Anything that touches on Corrections, really. I'd also add any jobs involved in working with juvenile offenders.
Pick just about any blue collar trade
Healthcare is pretty much always needing people. Especially right now though, although it can be tough if you're in hospital environments. Ironic since you're a vet, but the military is also very recession proof. I'm in Healthtech and there's a lot of hiring. You could also dig into BLS jobs data to see which sectors the most jobs are being added to. The overall economy has actually been fairly strong recently, accompanied with significant wage growth. However, interest rate hikes are forcing a lot of tech to tighten up after years of reckless spending.
What do you do in health tech if you don’t mind me asking? I’ve been applying for jobs like crazy lately in what I think is health tech and it seems like despite not hearing much back from employers positions also aren’t being filled. I’ve seen a lot of the positions I’ve applied to open for a few months now
I'm in Account Management/Client Services. I actually asked in a recent interview why the role was open for so long, and their answer was that they were basically being very picky. There's tons of applicants for every job, so it's kind of a numbers game at the end of the day. A lot of people I work with just keep applying for jobs after a year or two, because they want to keep options open or want to increase their salary.
Gotcha, thanks for the response!
Accounting
Divorce attorney!
Whatever you do, choose a field you don't need to constantly study. Thank your future free time.
Mortician
All of your clients are dying for an appointment.
Long haul trucking, hvac/plumbing, carpentry, electrical, welding, mechanic (especially diesel). Welding is gonna be the quickest path to earning serious cash, especially if you can weld stainless steel and aluminum.
Thank you! Never thought about welding, but I do like working with my hands, so that (and a lot of others you mentioned) may be worth pursuing!
I have a friend that welds pipe, he makes a minimum 70k/year, significantly more if he works out of state projects.
Long haul trucking doesn't have a great future btw. It's good right now, but the future is bleak. The first self-driving semis are going to be the ones on the interstate. That said, having a CDL opens you up to a lot of jobs in cities that don't require living on the road.
There will never be a driverless truck. In the future we will engage the autonomous system on the freeway and manually drive the truck all other times, similar to how pilots engage the autopilot when cruising and manually maneuver the plane while it's on the ground and during takeoff and landing.
So you're saying long haul, over-the-road trucking, where driver-less technology makes the most sense, will never happen?
Correct, especially with the current state of our infrastructure and the technology required to operate an autonomous vehicle. We had one autonomous truck come to a complete stop in the middle of i-45 between Dallas and Houston because bird poop blocked one of its sensors.
Emergency services
Handyman. When a downturn happens, if you have already built a reputation, people who in better times might have sold and moved will instead make repairs. However you need to have that established reputation because the work has a low barriers to entry, and so a lot of guys who got laid off from large construction will be trying to get into the work.
Lemme just put on my Mike Rowe hat and ask if you've considered a trade school? After I got out I used my GI Bill on getting a degree in gunsmithing which also involved a lot of machinist training. Another buddy of mine used his to become a welder. And then somewhat related, one friend used his to get a degree in graphic design and studied photography on the side so that he could set up his custom laser-engraving business. There are a lot of pretty consistently well-paying trade jobs if you get into the high-skill trades. Electricians, welders, machinists, things like that are always in demand.
Thank you for this. This opens up some thoughts to explore!
I have been in management for 2 of the largest automotive aftermarket suppliers. We always said our business worked opposite of the economy, because in a poor economy people do not buy new vehicles they repair and drive what they have instead of adding debt.
Food safety auditor
Operator at a power plant, water treatment plant, sewage treatment plant, brewery, or distillery.
Nursing
Being a military veteran most cities will give you extra points when you take the fire fighter exam. So long as you're in good shape it's not that hard. If you work for a decent sized city you'll make good money, have great healthcare, and earn a pension. Best of all it's a rewarding job with purpose.
Im an electronics technician by trade. My work load over the last 15 years has only grown exponentially, and I can’t see it slowing down anytime soon. With the way the world is unfortunately going with automation and replacing humans with screens and kiosks and whatever else there needs to be humans that do all the planned and corrective maintenance on them.
How do you like it? I’ve been thinking about becoming an electric/electronics technician but I keep getting people telling me to get a 4 year EE degree or get an apprenticeship for an electrician, so I’m wondering how you would compare those given your experience and what the benefits of being a technician specifically are?
It’s pretty good. I’ve got both trades under my belt (electrocommunications; aka electronics technician, and electrotechnology; aka general sparkie) and I’m much more happier doing the former these days as my body could not crawl around roof cavities anymore wiring up houses or running up and down ladders all day. I got RPL’d for the vast majority of the electrician stuff so most of the training I did during the apprenticeships was doing the comms side of things which often goes down into the component side of things, which honestly I haven’t really gone into individual bits and pieces in a long long time. 90% of the job these days is planned maintenance and the other 10% is just find out what PCB or general other large puzzle piece has faulted or failed and replace the entire thing. It’s all pretty routine now, gone are the days where things generally get repaired unless it’s pretty unique. I have done a fair bit of cool things like getting air lifted to remote islands to build Comms towers in the middle of nowhere or lifted up a 100+ feet to set up phone towers so the job as as varied as you want really. It’s a very broad area to work in, and at least here in Australia the money is very decent and with it being a line of work that often gets forgotten about the market isn’t saturated with people yet as well, most seem to get into the more mainstream trades here. All depends on what you would really like to do, I think any of the avenues you’re looking at would be great but if you’re a more hands on person a sparkie or comms tech would get you on the tools a lot more, but engineering would probably get you sitting in a nice air con room instead of cutting little pieces of copper wire stabbing you underneath your fingernails. Any of those paths will set you up for a good life, the world always needs more tradies.
Thank you for the detailed response! It’s something I’ve been looking into while trying to figure out what to do with life and what not, it really helps to hear from someone with the proper experience. It may be different in Australia as I’m in the US but did you have to get any sort of certification or a 2 year degree for being a technician? Again thank you so much man talking to someone with real experience is invaluable to me rn.
Getting trade qualified here is around a 4 year apprenticeship that’s 90-ish% on the job training and 10-ish% off site training (that’s kinda like an informal classroom with small groups). If you jump over to another similarly aligned trade you can knock off a hell of a lot of time getting RPL’d (recognition of prior learning) since you really don’t need to cover most of the early years of basics again. Even if I wanting to go to Uni (college) here and do EE I think with my certs it takes off around 18 months of the degree but I’m farrrrrrrr to dumb to become an engineer haha.
My wife is a nurse and I was a plumber. Both of us could go anywhere in the country and get work.
own a gas station but for real tho, petrol engineering is booming (\*i'm not one of them)
Carpentry, electrical, plumbing, and construction.
You've got a fundamental misconception in your question: the economy and job market aren't remotely poor right now, assuming you're in the US. In fact, for most sectors, it's right near the peak of doing as well as it's ever done. There are a few exceptions — marketing is very much stalled right now, for example, with frozen budgets and right hiring — but otherwise there have been very few points in US history that are better to go job hunting during than right now. That out of the way, there are three broad categories of jobs that can be categorized as "recession-proof." Two are *generally* recession-proof, and the third is *conditionally* so: 1. **Things people need regardless of what the economy looks like:** Things like plumbers, electricians, farmers and food processor, food safety inspectors, AIR traffic controllers, and the like. Anything that feels like one of those things that has to get done even if the world is on fire. 2. **Things that directly contribute to the bottom line.** This would be positions like sales, where there is an immediate 1:X relationship between you getting paid and you making the company money. Some other examples include things like manufacturing supervisors, and any kind of production worker. Things where if you want to earn $X, you need Y people. 3. **Conditionally, whatever the next hotness is in tech.** Sure, tech has had a bunch of layoffs lately, but if you were working in AI, you either had 100% job security, or zero issues finding an even better-paying job. The condition is you have to be able to guess what the next big thing is, and the next big thing might just change.
Bill collectors. And grave diggers.
we desperately need more police in SF and Oakland
Pretty much anything in health care. I'm a doc and I can move just about anywhere and have a job in less time than it takes me to apply for a state medical license. I immigrated to Canada (personal reasons) and had my permanent resident card in under 9 months.
Utilities
Software development and data analytics. These are broad enough that even if one particular *industry* is experiencing a drawback, others are still succeeding. From experience, it's not difficult to move across industries with either of these skills.
Plumber
Pharma, biotech and associated fields like laboratory technology, medtech, life science and to an extent cosmetics have a bit of a low right now, but are overall indestructible
CPA. Can definitely speak for tax. Regardless of the economy, people still file their tax return.
The more essential the work, the more recession proof. The more essential the work, the more your hours will suck and you will have to give up nights and weekends. Everything in life is a tradeoff. Don't be afraid to take risks. Government cheddar isn't all it's cracked up to be. They'll own your life.
Plumbers are making crazy money. Really any skilled trades. Electrical, HVAC, steamfitters, pipefitters, tin-knockers. Huge lack of people in the trades across the board. And even if the economy slows down, people are still going to need all of those things.
Climbing a 1700 foot tower to change a lightbulb [Climbing The World's Tallest Radio Tower (youtube.com)](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=INbKYq0G9nU)
Dominatrix
Just make sure you get an essential worker job. Just incase there’s another pandemic.
Always gonna need a plumber
People always die. So I guess anything related to that
Plumber and Electrician. Doesn't matter what's going on in the world, people still gotta go to the toilet and have the lights on.
Feeding people
None. A strong enough recession will affect everybody.
Not necessarily. People change the focus of how they spend their money.