Industry group, 4812
Nonscheduled Air Transportation
56,890 people work in this industry in the US, at mean pay of $113,680 a year (BLS, May 2025). 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: 28 million hours at what they cost. Not a forecast of savings.
- 39%
- 9%
- 52%
of the paid hours are within reach now in tasks people already bring to Claude. Another 20% 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 industry'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, 22%. Today's estimate: 25%.
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 92% of the people.
| People | Pay here | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Commercial Pilots | 18,580 | 24% | 9.4 million | $133K |
| Customer Service Representatives | 1,400 | 64% | 1.9 million | $48K |
| Sales Representatives of Services, Except Advertising, Insurance, Financial Services, and Travel | 1,810 | 43% | 1.6 million | $63K |
| Bookkeeping, Accounting, and Auditing Clerks | 910 | 78% | 1.5 million | $56K |
| Office Clerks, General | 1,050 | 54% | 1.2 million | $72K |
| Dispatchers, Except Police, Fire, and Ambulance | 580 | 80% | 960,296 | $58K |
| General and Operations Managers | 2,010 | 23% | 953,228 | $143K |
| Aircraft Mechanics and Service Technicians | 6,420 | 7% | 894,693 | $80K |
| First-Line Supervisors of Mechanics, Installers, and Repairers | 1,190 | 27% | 658,406 | $118K |
| Production, Planning, and Expediting Clerks | 420 | 63% | 553,864 | $61K |
| Reservation and Transportation Ticket Agents and Travel Clerks | 300 | 74% | 459,264 | $55K |
| Aircraft Service Attendants | 1,310 | 15% | 411,445 | $43K |
People: BLS counts for this industry, May 2025. Pay here: the median paid for the job in this industry, else its mean, else the national median. 53 smaller jobs (4,360 people) count in every total but are not listed. Task data covers 96% of the industry'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 industry, on the chosen pace and reliability.
- Choose routes, altitudes, and speeds that will provide the fastest, safest, and smoothest flights.Commercial Pilots1.8 million hours100% of the task within reach
- Plan flights according to government and company regulations, using aeronautical charts and navigation instruments.Commercial Pilots1.8 million hours100% of the task within reach
- Plan and formulate flight activities and test schedules and prepare flight evaluation reports.Commercial Pilots1.4 million hours100% of the task within reach
- Order changes in fuel supplies, loads, routes, or schedules to ensure safety of flights.Commercial Pilots1.2 million hours100% of the task within reach
- Obtain and review data such as load weights, fuel supplies, weather conditions, and flight schedules to determine flight plans and identify needed changes.Commercial Pilots1.1 million hours100% of the task within reach
- Coordinate flight activities with ground crews and air traffic control, and inform crew members of flight and test procedures.Commercial Pilots1.1 million hours100% of the task within reach
- Consider airport altitudes, outside temperatures, plane weights, and wind speeds and directions to calculate the speed needed to become airborne.Commercial Pilots900,461 hours100% of the task within reach
- Develop sales presentations or proposals to explain service specifications.Sales Representatives of Services, Except Advertising, Insurance, Financial Services, and Travel773,149 hours100% of the task within reach
- Write specified information in flight records, such as flight times, altitudes flown, and fuel consumption.Commercial Pilots564,237 hours100% of the task within reach
- Request changes in altitudes or routes as circumstances dictate.Commercial Pilots408,492 hours100% of the task within reach
Scan a typical company in this industry
The industry's largest jobs, in the proportions BLS counts across the whole industry, at the pay it pays, run through the company scan. A starting point before you have a roster, or a benchmark for the one you have.
Next to this industry
Within reach now and by the end of 2028, long-run pace, four in five.
How it is built: BLS counts the people in each job in this industry; each job's tasks and their lengths give its share within reach at a date; the industry'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