According to a survey that was summarized in Science Daily, they ain’t the happiest guys on the planet:
“The least satisfying jobs were held by roofers, with only 25 percent of them saying they found their job satisfying. The other low satisfaction jobs were held by waiters and servers, laborers (except construction trades), bartenders, handpackers and packagers, freight, stock and material handlers, apparel clothing salespersons, cashiers, food preparers (excluding cooks and chefs), expeditors (customer service representatives), butchers and meat cutters, and furniture and home furnishing salespersons.
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Across all occupations, on average, 47 percent of people said they were very satisfied with their jobs and 33 percent said they were very happy. The top three jobs for satisfaction were clergy (87 percent reporting being very satisfied), firefighters (80 percent) and physical therapists (78 percent). Other top jobs, in which more than 60 percent of the respondents said they were very satisfied were education administrators, painters and sculpters, teachers, authors, psychologists, special education teachers, operating engineers, office supervisors and security and financial services salespersons.
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On the happiness scale, clergy were also on top, with 67 percent very happy. Two other top three jobs on happiness were firefighters and transportation ticket and reservation agents (both 57 percent very happy). Other jobs high on the happiness scale were architects, special education teachers, actors and directors, science technicians, mechanics and repairers, industrial engineers, airline pilots and navigators, hardware and building supplies salespersons and personal housekeepers.
On the bottom of the scale were garage and service station attendants (13 percent reported being happy), roofers (14 percent) and molding and casting machine operators (11 percent). Other workers who said they are generally unhappy were construction laborers, welfare service aides, amusement and recreation attendants, hotel maids, pressing machine operators, electronic repairers, kitchen workers, and machine operators. Previous work had shown that job satisfaction increases with prestige or social standings, and many of the people reporting high satisfaction and happiness also had jobs respected by society, Smith said. Some workers whose jobs have a high degree of prestige, however, such as doctors and lawyers, did not make the list of the top twelve most satisfied or happy. Those jobs also involve great responsibility and large opportunities for stress, Smith said.
Summary of the survey at: http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2007/04/070419092028.htm
Replies
If you will notice - a lot of the jobs named there in the survey are the kind that are heavy strenuous work and that can be found with minimal education.
what sort of fellow do you suppose if often attracted to those positions?
I'll leave you to your own speculations but mention that in my twenty years roofing I saw a high percentage of either low-lifes or students who never intended to do roofing more than a few months.
Add to that, the fact that it is dangerous painfull work that few people appreciate.
You want them to be happy too?
Welcome to the
Taunton University of Knowledge FHB Campus at Breaktime.
where ...
Excellence is its own reward!
Add to that, the fact that it is dangerous painfull work that few people appreciate.
I'm doing a small tear off and re-roof job on the side - darn friends, who'd of thunk that I had any!
But it's bringing back all the memories of what you describe. Nothing about it except for maybe the fresh air is fun!
Doug
When I worked as a roofer, I remember many days when I straddled the ridge of a house, looking out at a beautiful view on a sunny day, blue sky overhead, when I thought, this is a wonderful place to work. I'm one of the luckiest guys in town -- not like all those poor fools stuck in an office cubicle. Of course, there were other days when my mood was different -- scratching tar and gravel, raising dust on a windy day, stinging my eyes so bad they turned red....
Edited 4/20/2007 6:20 am ET by MartinHolladay
I once heard a comedian say,
" I used to be a hot tar roofer, boy I'll never forget that day!" Mike
Trust in God, but row away from the rocks.
RIP Mitch Hedberg
http://www.mitchhedberg.net
Mitch Hedberg hey...He was one of the best comedians. Every couple of days they play him on Rock 101 in Vancouver.Martin
Could be because that the very thing that keeps us in business ( rain,Ice) is exactly what keeps us from working. Days off, don't pay well.
BTW, I love doing copper and wood roofs, someone else can have the rest. And yes, the views are fantastic.
Parolee # 40835
wow . . . a British happiness index a couple of years ago found the opposite. Architects were dead last (behind lawyers, secretaries and civil servants), while the trades were closer to the top (happiest). Hairdressers were the absolute happiest.
wonder what happened in the last couple of years to reverse everything
http://www.city-and-guilds.co.uk/cps/rde/xchg/SID-0AC0478D-79842F7A/cgonline/hs.xsl/1480.html
I wonder if it isn't a question of how they asked and of who in particular.
For example a laborer doing a filthy job for low pay or a union laborer making $29 an hour plus $22 in benefits! buic
Oh yeah, I love hot tar roofing.
"Hot, hot, need more hot over here."
What view?
Oh yeah, I love hot tar roofing.
LOL!
When anyone asks DW flat out with no hint of the question, she will undoubtedly answer that the worst job of all time she has ever done was melting hot tar in a 55 gal barrel over a wood fire. (40 some years ago when we wuz poor)
No doubt. Every time I get on a roof I say never again. I said that when shingling a doghouse.
And Piff - man 20 years? You gots some he man stamina or somethin. 2 days of that stuff and I'm smoked.
be grounded
Real trucks dont have sparkplugs
Yeah, twenty years.It kinda sneaks up on you.When I started it was because the job was available and it paid twenty cents an hour moe than carpentry.I took a look around and saw 30 YO roofers who looked fifty and 50 YO roofers who looked seventy from all the hard work, hot sun, dehydration, and i'm supposing more t6han an average intake of pain meds, self prescribed or otherwise.I said to my self - "Self, three years of this stuff is all you want."After six months I hit a stride where I was amoung the fastest shingle layers and making some pretty darn good money for the time, making it harder toi swithch to carpentry....There is something that gets stuck in your blood about it though.The views
The adrenaline rushes
Pride in doing it better...
Welcome to the Taunton University of Knowledge FHB Campus at Breaktime. where ... Excellence is its own reward!
Well after 15 years of roofing I finally got out and started home building.
I know this. When I was roofing I would always take the section with the valley,the rake,the chimney,running bottoms on an 8 or 10 pitch off a board nailed two feet up to get the brackets on, the skirt, whatever I could to not just keep laying straight boring runs of shingles. It is a job where you look to tackle anything that seems remotely different than the ordinary because everything about roofing is so monotonous. You really feel like a robot after a while. Perhaps that's why I branched out and kept learning whatever I could to get me out . Perhaps its part of the reason most roofers are unhappy. Your job must be satisfying to a degree that it makes you feel like a necessary part of the machine called life. Once you know all the ins and outs of roofing there is little left to tickle your senses.
"Keep the fire burning"
You left out the "rush" you get when you try walking on the ground after a day of navigating the planes and pitches. BTW, some sunglasses make that worse,at least for me.
I almost caused a car wreck yesterday, I was cutting a hunk of copper for a gutter end cap, and it was BRIGHT new, and to keep the shine outta my face and orient it for my snips, I was flashing it ( and the suns reflection) away from my face...expensive milf in a SUV, got the shine and almost hit our trailer..and me.
This one actually pulled over an apologized. that's rare round here.
I'd rather be up on the roof, than getting my ladder off the truck, parked on a side street, with traffic whizzing by, I almost got creamed that way too. Folks with a cell phone, or putting on lipstick, dont SEE..I swear there is a brain fart, or I am invisible when toting a ladder.Parolee # 40835
"Expensive milf"....
LOL, have to remember that!
Trust me...thays all expensive, milf or not...I must be ugly, cus the only ones I get a shot at are the dog walkers , with, two leashes, and they are so concerned with the ankle biters on tether, they forget they have a rack falling outta the sockets.
But , I am married, so I don't dwelllParolee # 40835
Anyone ever get into poured gypsum roofs? I got sent out on one of those jobs, my first year in the union. It was supposed to be a couple of days on a new school in Goshen, NY. Out of town contractor with his own crew but the union deal was; at least one local man on the job. So the BA called the enthusiastic new guy, me.
Arrived on time but everyone was already up on the roof so I went up the ladder and over the parapet to discover...a bunch of monkeys bouncing from one tiny I beam to the next, carrying stiff fiberglas insulation panels. As I stood there, fortunately over an area that had already been laid in with insulation, I tried to grasp what was going on. The crew guys were literally jogging across the roof, leaping from one tiny beam to the next. The little I beams were running perpendicular to the bar joists and spaced 32" on centers so long strides were the only way to move around.
Then the foreman jogged over and introduced himself. He explained that the first part of the job was to lay in the fiberglas panels, which had been lifted up on pallets. He cautioned me not to step on the insulation because it wouldn't take any kind of pin point load. Falling through meant a quick trip to the concrete floor, about twelve feet below.
I was tempted to beg off the whole thing immediately. I wasn't real comfortable at heights, usually taking some time to adjust to any new ladder or scaffold before the pucker factor zeroed out and allowed me to feel my legs and feet again. But there I was...bottom of the work list at the union...needing a pay check and all these guys were happily leaping from one little beam to the next, like a bunch of circus acrobats. So I just took off, following the rythym which seemed to keep them all moving. About half way across the roof, over the first open area I'd seen, it dawned on me what-da-phug I was doing and I came to a screeching halt. Legs spread, flailing my arms to keep my balance, I was hung out to dry.
"Hey guys", yelled the foreman, "we got a frozen one over here". Everyone stopped momentarily, to point and laugh while the foreman quickly jogged over.
"You OK?"
"Yeah, I think so. I just got a look at the floor and it startled me to see how far up we are. I'm used to walking 2X4 top plates, eight feet up, not running across one inch beams like this."
"I understand. We see it all the time. It happens to most of the first time guys. A lot of 'em never get off the ladder, just say no thanks and head for home."
"I don't blame them." I replied, knowing that the same thought had gone through my head, just moments before.
"OK, just take a couple of deep breaths and start over. And this time keep your eyes on the beams, nowhere else".
It was perfect advice, delivered with real brotherly concern. Like a good coach, he knew exactly what to say and how to add the right amount of encouragement. I could also feel his respect for my willingness to overcome the same fear he'd witnessed so many times in others.
Once I'd made a few trips across the roof, stopping and sliding the insulation between the beams, I was good to go. Adrenaline was keeping my focus real sharp and being surrounded by acrobats made it much easier to quiet mental images of disaster.
BTW, the one inch I beams had a two inch bottom flange, which gave support to the fiberglas panels.
I'm surprised to see bartending.
My years behind the bar were some of the most fun years I can kinda/sorta remember ...
then again ... my years on this side of the bar haven't been soo bad either?
those unhappy bartenders must have worked with ugly waitesses ...
Jeff
Buck Construction
Artistry In Carpentry
Pittsburgh Pa
That's because the survey was done on a Monday.
Job satisfaction has most to do with the attitude of the person and not so much about the work. Everyone of us work around people who hate their job and try to make everyone feel miserable. Same job and totally different attitude. Best thing to do is to get rid of the morale demolition expert. He belongs on the end of jack hammer doing concrete demolition by himself. His attitude is contagious when around others.
Everywhere I have lived people seem to find a way to complain about something.