Airline pilot – the career for lazy people

I stumbled across this article listing careers that earn more pay working fewer hours. Basically, it’s a listing of 33 jobs, most of which you haven’t heard of before, that have some combination of pay that is above average ($37,037), and/or work in hours per week or hours per year that is below average (40 and 2080 respectively).

While it might put my weekly hours over my personal limit (which is very close to zero), I thought it would be fun to analyze the data in a little more detail to determine which ones really are the best. Among their list, several ‘bests’ could be found. Here are the top few in several categories:

Total pay per year:
1: Psychiatrist – $135,671
2: Aircraft pilots, copilots and flight engineers – $127,501
3: Law teacher, post-secondary – $101,678
4: Optometrist – $100,419

Pay per hour (annual shown, weekly top-3 ranking is the same):
1: Aircraft pilots, copilots and flight engineers – $109.82
2: Psychiatrist – $71.94
3: Law teacher, post-secondary – $66.24

Hours per year:
1: Aircraft pilots, copilots and flight engineers – 1161
2-4: Post-secondary teachers: Business – 1488, Physics – 1489, Law – 1535
5: Speech-language pathologist

Hours per week:
1: Aircraft pilots, copilots and flight engineers – 22.3
2: Interpreters and translators – 32.4
3: Dental hygienist – 34.6

Work weeks per year:
1-3: Post-secondary teachers: Business – 38.15, Physics – 38.88, Law – 40.39
4: Speech-language pathologist – 43.3
5: Clinical, counseling and school psychologists – 44.09

So, the best careers depend on the specific kind of lazy you’d like to be. The two that stick out, though, air pilots (and flight engineers), and post-secondary teachers. Pilots work more weeks per year (~52 v.s. <40). If you want several months per year off, Law professor sounds like a real great deal. Good money (over $100k / year) and plenty of time off in big blocks. For a little better pay overall with more weeks per year of work, but fewer overall hours and far fewer weekly hours, pilot is the clear winner of lazy person's career.

Of course, that data is all based on averages. What's the reality? I went on a trip that started January 3rd and ended January 17th. I'm leaving again tomorrow for training and will be gone through February 11th. So I will have had 6 days at home in January. Starting Wednesday, not only will I work 8 hours a day 5 days a week in training, but I'll have to study for countless hours evenings and weekends. That pace will continue all the way through February as I do my sim training. 22.3 hours a week? I don't think so…

V-