Also called: Entrepreneur, Co-Founder
Starts a new company around an idea, raises money, hires the first team and decides what gets built.
One hour you're pitching investors on Zoom, the next you're answering a customer complaint yourself because there's no support team yet. You interview a possible first engineer, check how many days of cash are left in the bank, and stay up late rewriting the pitch deck.
Wildly uneven. Most founders pay themselves little or nothing at first, and most startups fail. Venture-funded founders often draw $100k-$180k salaries; the real money (sometimes millions or billions) only comes if the company is sold or goes public, which is rare.
Approximate: anchored on Bureau of Labor Statistics data for a broader job group.
No formal education, about 0 years after high school. No degree required; many founders have a bachelor's in business, engineering or computer science, and some drop out.
Ways in: Self-taught, 4-year college, On-the-job training. Training cost: Under $15k.
Majors to look at: Business Administration, Entrepreneurship, Computer Science, Engineering.
Growing about average. Not a BLS category; startup formation in the US hit record highs in the 2020s.
Low risk for 10 years. AI lets tiny teams build and sell more, which also means more competition; taking risks, raising money and leading people stays human.
Classes: Business or entrepreneurship elective, AP Computer Science Principles, Speech and debate, AP Microeconomics.
Official data: O*NET occupation 11-1011.
Career Universe is an early version. Pay, training and AI-risk figures are estimates to start your own research, not verified facts. The research was written with AI research assistants, checked by validation scripts and spot-checked by hand. Check anything important with schools, employers and official sources. How the numbers work.