Archivists

Low Risk
40%

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Vote Comments (8)
AUTOMATION RISK
CALCULATED
36%
(Low Risk)
POLLING
43%
(Moderate Risk, Based on 135 votes)
Average: 40%
LABOR DEMAND
GROWTH
8.0%
by year 2033
WAGES
$59,910
or $28.80 per hour
Volume
7,150
as of 2023
SUMMARY
What does this snowflake show?
The Snowflake is a visual summary of the five badges: Automation Risk (calculated), Risk (polled), Growth, Wages and Volume. It gives you an instant snapshot of an occupations profile. The colour of the Snowflake relates to its size. The better the occupation scores in relation to others, the larger and greener the Snowflake becomes.
JOB SCORE
5.4/10
What's this?
Job Score (higher is better):

We rate jobs using four factors. These are:

- Chance of being automated
- Job growth
- Wages
- Volume of available positions

These are some key things to think about when job hunting.

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Calculated automation risk

36% (Low Risk)

Low Risk (21-40%): Jobs in this level have a limited risk of automation, as they demand a mix of technical and human-centric skills.

More information on what this score is, and how it is calculated is available here.

We haven't found any important qualities of this job that can't be easily automated

User poll

43% chance of full automation within the next two decades

Our visitors have voted they are unsure if this occupation will be automated. However, employees may be able to find reassurance in the automated risk level we have generated, which shows 36% chance of automation.

What do you think the risk of automation is?

What is the likelihood that Archivists will be replaced by robots or artificial intelligence within the next 20 years?

Sentiment

The following graph is shown where there are enough votes to produce meaningful data. It displays user poll results over time, providing a clear indication of sentiment trends.

Sentiment over time (yearly)

Growth

Very fast growth relative to other professions

The number of 'Archivists' job openings is expected to rise 8.0% by 2033

Total employment, and estimated job openings

* Data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics for the period between 2023 and 2033
Updated projections are due 09-2025.

Wages

Moderately paid relative to other professions

In 2023, the median annual wage for 'Archivists' was $59,910, or $29 per hour

'Archivists' were paid 24.7% higher than the national median wage, which stood at $48,060

Wages over time

* Data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics

Volume

Significantly lower range of job opportunities compared to other professions

As of 2023 there were 7,150 people employed as 'Archivists' within the United States.

This represents around < 0.001% of the employed workforce across the country

Put another way, around 1 in 21 thousand people are employed as 'Archivists'.

Job description

Appraise, edit, and direct safekeeping of permanent records and historically valuable documents. Participate in research activities based on archival materials.

SOC Code: 25-4011.00

Comments (8)

Leave a comment
Jack H (Low)
13 Feb 2025 23:20
A lot of an archivists job is organizing and preserving physical documents so unless we see light speed advancements in robotics I doubt this job will be automated any time soon. Also, digitizing is an agonizingly slow process and a number of archives will likely never be digitized.
H Jon B (Low)
19 Aug 2024 13:34
First of all, there are many archives which have not and will likely never be digitized so there will be perhaps decades of hands-on work left to do before it's all available online. Second, many archives and documents collection practices are governed in most jurisdictions by laws and legislation. Therefore, having an in-house archivist around is good so institutions stick to legal documents and media retention regulations. Finally, archivists are like data architects. Any institution that accumulates records will eventually need someone to organize it and that organization of documents will require creativity and intuition to meet that specific institution's needs. Every institution is different and will require a creative human to design a system of organization.
بلعباس هجيرة (Uncertain)
23 Oct 2023 10:57
Due to the presence of archival tasks that are difficult for artificial intelligence robots to perform, they require pure human effort and intelligence.
Gavin Couchot (No chance)
06 Jul 2023 06:59
This job requires not just knowledge on history which ai can do but it is human centric for the most part Ai would not have the capability’s to understand it’s importants or significance
Sol (Moderate)
24 May 2023 23:31
Essentially data entry. Most sorting and categorisation can be more quickly, easily, and more accurately done by AI. Will become a sink for the overqualified and underpaid completing low-skilled data entry whilst the system completes complex archival activity.
Michael (Low)
07 Dec 2022 16:04
Physical preservation is a significant part of this job, so I don’t see how this can be automated without huge breakthroughs in robotics
Saddam (Highly likely)
16 Oct 2019 13:44
I am a History Graduate, my job was supposed to be checking records and keeping them in good shape in both paper and non paper. but everything is changed to electronic and digital for a long time. You just need to digitalize everything and store it. No need to have an Archivist. Save lots of money and when you need something you can use search engine.
Maria
13 Mar 2021 19:04
You have a very mechanical view of the work of an archivist. Scanning all? And who will pay for the preservation costs?
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