Also called: Field Worker, Harvest Worker, Picker
Plants, tends, and harvests fruits, vegetables, and other crops by hand.
You start early to beat the heat, picking strawberries, thinning lettuce, or pruning orchards with a crew. It's physical, fast-paced teamwork, often paid by the box or bucket. Many workers move up to crew leader or supervisor.
Often piece-rate and seasonal.
Approximate: anchored on Bureau of Labor Statistics data for a broader job group.
No formal education, about 0 years after high school. No formal education required; learned on the job.
Ways in: On-the-job training. Training cost: Get paid while you train.
Growing about average (about 2% over 10 years). Agricultural workers overall.
Low risk in 5 years, medium in 10. Robot pickers for strawberries and apples are improving; hand harvest holds through 2031 but likely shrinks after.
Age 14+. One way to start: Ask local farms, orchards and berry growers about harvest-season jobs; farm work has the youngest legal ages
Classes: Spanish, Biology, Agriculture science CTE.
Official data: O*NET occupation 45-2092.
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.