Metro area, Iowa
Iowa City, IA
93,760 people work in this area, at mean pay of $65,420 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: 39 million hours at what they cost. Not a forecast of savings.
- 37%
- 18%
- 45%
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, 20%. Today's estimate: 23%.
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 53% of the people.
| People | Pay here | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Registered Nurses | 4,090 | 28% | 2.4 million | $86K |
| Medical Secretaries and Administrative Assistants | 1,290 | 81% | 2.2 million | $50K |
| Customer Service Representatives | 1,190 | 64% | 1.6 million | $42K |
| Office Clerks, General | 1,230 | 54% | 1.4 million | $46K |
| Retail Salespersons | 2,710 | 19% | 1.1 million | $30K |
| Bookkeeping, Accounting, and Auditing Clerks | 660 | 78% | 1.1 million | $49K |
| Cashiers | 2,090 | 19% | 804,232 | $29K |
| General and Operations Managers | 1,600 | 23% | 758,789 | $81K |
| First-Line Supervisors of Food Preparation and Serving Workers | 850 | 40% | 714,273 | $39K |
| Heavy and Tractor-Trailer Truck Drivers | 2,360 | 14% | 672,506 | $62K |
| Secretaries and Administrative Assistants, Except Legal, Medical, and Executive | 630 | 43% | 558,232 | $45K |
| Stockers and Order Fillers | 1,350 | 19% | 533,520 | $36K |
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. 297 smaller jobs (38,790 people) count in every total but are not listed. Task data covers 88% 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.
- Perform administrative or managerial functions, such as taking responsibility for a unit's staff, budget, planning, or long-range goals.Registered Nurses685,269 hours60% of the task within reach
- Perform bookkeeping duties, such as credits or collections, preparing and sending financial statements or bills, and keeping financial records.Medical Secretaries and Administrative Assistants516,731 hours100% of the task within reach
- Maintain accurate, detailed reports and records.Registered Nurses469,087 hours100% of the task within reach
- Maintain knowledge of current sales and promotions, policies regarding payment and exchanges, and security practices.Retail Salespersons328,372 hours50% of the task within reach
- Compute, record, and proofread data and other information, such as records or reports.Office Clerks, General308,083 hours100% of the task within reach
- Keep periodic balance sheets of amounts and numbers of transactions.Cashiers307,304 hours100% of the task within reach
- Compile reports of cost factors, such as labor, production, storage, and equipment.A job in this area293,142 hours100% of the task within reach
- Plan, organize, and control the operations of a cocktail lounge or bar.Bartenders290,287 hours50% of the task within reach
- Operate office equipment, such as voice mail messaging systems, and use word processing, spreadsheet, or other software applications to prepare reports, invoices, financial statements, letters, case histories, or medical records.Medical Secretaries and Administrative Assistants287,666 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 Representatives269,327 hours100% of the task within reach
Other areas in Iowa
Within reach now and by the end of 2028, long-run pace, four in five.
- Des Moines-West Des Moines, IA404,130 people23% now, 39% by 2028
- Southeast Iowa nonmetropolitan area200,390 people20% now, 30% by 2028
- Davenport-Moline-Rock Island, IA-IL180,450 people22% now, 35% by 2028
- Northwest Iowa nonmetropolitan area145,960 people20% now, 29% by 2028
- Cedar Rapids, IA139,260 people22% now, 35% by 2028
- Northeast Iowa nonmetropolitan area99,370 people21% now, 31% by 2028
- Waterloo-Cedar Falls, IA84,260 people21% now, 32% by 2028
- Sioux City, IA-NE-SD75,010 people20% now, 30% 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