Metro area, Illinois
Champaign-Urbana, IL
105,500 people work in this area, at mean pay of $68,290 a year (BLS, May 2025), in every industry. What follows is how much of their working time the best AI models could finish, when, and in which jobs and tasks. Estimates.
of the paid hours. Estimate.
a year: 43 million hours at what they cost. Not a forecast of savings.
- 36%
- 18%
- 46%
of the paid hours are within reach now in tasks people already bring to Claude. Another 18% is within reach in tasks not yet seen there.
Across the US: 22% within reach now and 37% by the end of 2028, on the long-run pace at four in five.
Share of the paid hours within reach, now to 2030
What each choice means: , , , , . Every pace starts from .
How far this has come
With GPT-4, measured in March 2023, 0% of this area's paid hours were within reach at . With Claude 3.7 Sonnet, measured in February 2025, 2%. With Claude Mythos Preview (early), measured in April 2026, 19%. Today's estimate: 22%.
A backcast: today's task data with the best model METR had measured by each date. It shows how fast the models have moved, not what anyone forecast at the time.
Where the hours are
Jobs by hours within reach now. The 40 largest jobs hold 52% of the people.
| People | Pay here | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Office Clerks, General | 2,180 | 54% | 2.5 million | $49K |
| Registered Nurses | 3,520 | 28% | 2 million | $90K |
| Customer Service Representatives | 1,480 | 64% | 2 million | $41K |
| Bookkeeping, Accounting, and Auditing Clerks | 710 | 78% | 1.1 million | $49K |
| Secretaries and Administrative Assistants, Except Legal, Medical, and Executive | 1,220 | 43% | 1.1 million | $48K |
| General and Operations Managers | 2,260 | 23% | 1.1 million | $97K |
| Cashiers | 2,500 | 19% | 962,000 | $32K |
| Medical Secretaries and Administrative Assistants | 570 | 81% | 956,780 | $46K |
| Teaching Assistants, Postsecondary | 2,480 | 18% | 949,150 | $50K |
| Receptionists and Information Clerks | 760 | 59% | 929,511 | $37K |
| Retail Salespersons | 2,180 | 19% | 879,674 | $34K |
| Stockers and Order Fillers | 2,060 | 19% | 814,112 | $35K |
People: BLS counts for this area, May 2025. Pay here: the median paid for the job in this area, else its mean, else the national median. 320 smaller jobs (45,070 people) count in every total but are not listed. Task data covers 90% of the area's people; the rest are in BLS "all other" groups with no task list, or in counts BLS does not publish.
The tasks with the most hours within reach by the end of 2028
Across the whole area, on the chosen pace and reliability.
- Develop teaching materials, such as syllabi, visual aids, answer keys, supplementary notes, or course Web sites.Teaching Assistants, Postsecondary747,015 hours100% of the task within reach
- Perform administrative or managerial functions, such as taking responsibility for a unit's staff, budget, planning, or long-range goals.Registered Nurses589,767 hours60% of the task within reach
- Compute, record, and proofread data and other information, such as records or reports.Office Clerks, General546,032 hours100% of the task within reach
- Evaluate and grade examinations, assignments, or papers, and record grades.Teaching Assistants, Postsecondary505,507 hours100% of the task within reach
- Maintain accurate, detailed reports and records.Registered Nurses403,713 hours100% of the task within reach
- Plan, organize, and control the operations of a cocktail lounge or bar.Bartenders393,173 hours50% of the task within reach
- Keep periodic balance sheets of amounts and numbers of transactions.Cashiers367,588 hours100% of the task within reach
- Obtain and examine all relevant information to assess validity of complaints and to determine possible causes, such as extreme weather conditions that could increase utility bills.Customer Service Representatives334,961 hours100% of the task within reach
- Schedule and maintain regular office hours to meet with students.Teaching Assistants, Postsecondary326,888 hours100% of the task within reach
- Complete contract forms, prepare change of address records, or issue service discontinuance orders, using computers.Customer Service Representatives308,948 hours100% of the task within reach
Other areas in Illinois
Within reach now and by the end of 2028, long-run pace, four in five.
- Chicago-Naperville-Elgin, IL-IN4,513,280 people22% now, 37% by 2028
- West Central Illinois nonmetropolitan area169,470 people21% now, 31% by 2028
- Peoria, IL166,020 people22% now, 36% by 2028
- East Central Illinois nonmetropolitan area143,050 people21% now, 31% by 2028
- South Illinois nonmetropolitan area141,200 people22% now, 32% by 2028
- Rockford, IL137,650 people21% now, 32% by 2028
- Northwest Illinois nonmetropolitan area126,860 people21% now, 30% by 2028
- Springfield, IL100,810 people24% now, 40% by 2028
How it is built: BLS counts the people in each job in this area; each job's tasks and their lengths give its share within reach at a date; the area's share is those shares weighted by people. Value is pay times 1.43 for benefits and payroll costs. Seen in Claude use splits today's share by whether Anthropic saw people bring each task to Claude in 2025; other AI tools are not counted. How it works