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Jobs For Millennials

Jobs for Millennials

Everybody knows that it’s a tough job market out there. One group of people who are intimately acquainted with that reality are the young adults known as Millennials. Opinions vary on their demographics. Some people say that they’re people born between 1975 and 1990, and others put the birth date at 1990 and later. However, when the quibbling is over, the fact remains that Millennials are young adults who are having a hard time finding work these days.The job market has been changing for many ye
Dave and Les Jacobs | Blend Images | Getty Images

Everybody knows that it’s a tough job market out there. One group of people who are intimately acquainted with that reality are the young adults known as Millennials. Opinions vary on their demographics. Some people say that they’re people born between 1975 and 1990, and others put the birth date at 1990 and later. However, when the quibbling is over, the fact remains that Millennials are young adults who are having a hard time finding work these days.

The job market has been changing for many years, and the era of going to work for one company after college and getting a gold watch at retirement 50 years later is dead and buried. Young job searchers looking for an employed future should explore emerging industries or established industries with opportunities for growth.

Whichever path Millennial job hunters take, choosing a profession that’s forward-looking is essential. Otherwise, they’ll be tomorrow’s equivalent of factory workers who built manual typewriters.

What are some jobs with good prospects for Millennials? Click ahead and find out.

By Daniel Bukszpan
Posted 12 August 2011

Digital Marketing Engineer

As marketing becomes increasingly dependent on digital technology, it’s more important than ever for businesses to have someone who knows the latest tools and give promotions an extra bit of oomph. The digital marketing engineer is just such a person.An engineer uses apps, e-mail, mobile and Internet technology to maximize sales and streamline advertising. This person should be highly proficient with content management systems, search engine optimization and social media. The engineer should als
Jeffrey Coolidge | Iconica | Getty Images

As marketing becomes increasingly dependent on digital technology, it’s more important than ever for businesses to have someone who knows the latest tools to give promotions an extra bit of oomph. The digital marketing engineer is just such a person.

An engineer uses apps, e-mail, mobile and Internet technology to maximize sales and streamline advertising. This person should be highly proficient with content management systems, search engine optimization and social media. The engineer should also be able to explain complex technical concepts to a non-technical audience without eliciting blank stares.

Disease Mapper

If you’ve ever wondered what geographical path a disease takes on its way to becoming a global pandemic --- and who hasn’t? ---- then you might want to consider becoming a disease mapper. Doctors have followed the projected spread of diseases on maps for hundreds of years, but today technological tools exist that show doctors accurate projections of where it may strike next.Disease mappers use satellite data to glean information about an area’s climate and vegetation. These factors affect the sp

If you’ve ever wondered what geographical path a disease takes on its way to becoming a global pandemic—and who hasn’t?—then you might want to consider becoming a disease mapper. Doctors have followed the projected spread of diseases on maps for hundreds of years, but today technological tools exist that show doctors accurate projections of where it may strike next.

Disease mappers use satellite data to glean information about an area’s climate and vegetation. These factors affect the spread of infectious diseases, and they’re combined with infection rate data from area hospitals. The salary for this profession can sometimes reach heights of $150,000 a year.

Web Developer

“Web developer” is a job description that has existed for a while now, and in the minds of many Millennials it’s as old as the hills. However, as long as companies have an Internet presence, they’ll always need someone to design, maintain and develop it. This makes the job ideal for Millennials, who grew up with Internet technology and aren’t intimidated by it.Web developers employ their skills in many professional settings, with both full-time and freelance hours. They should have the people sk
Pat LaCroix | Riser | Getty Images

“Web developer” is a job description that has existed for a while now, and in the minds of many Millennials it’s as old as the hills. However, as long as companies have an Internet presence, they’ll always need someone to design, maintain and develop it. This makes the job ideal for Millennials, who grew up with Internet technology and aren’t intimidated by it.

Web developers employ their skills in many professional settings, with both full-time and freelance hours. They should have the people skills necessary to translate convoluted Internet jargon into plain English for the benefit of the technological neophytes who employ them. The Bureau of Labor Statistics estimates that the mean annual salary for web developers is $79,370.

E-Book Producer

Anyone who uses mass transit is familiar with the sight of fellow commuters reading e-books. The convenience of this technology caused it catch on quickly with the public, just as digital music files did a few years ago. And just like mp3 files need to be created for iPods, “real” books need to be turned into e-books.When a new book comes out today, the chances are that the manuscript was created as an electronic file. However, in cases where an older book is being converted, an e-book producer
William Andrew | Photographer's Choice

Anyone who uses mass transit is familiar with the sight of fellow commuters reading e-books. The convenience of this technology caused it catch on quickly with the public, just as digital music files did a few years ago. And just as MP3 files need to be created for iPods, “real” books need to be turned into e-books.

When a new book comes out today, the chances are that the manuscript was created as an electronic file. However, in cases where an older book is being converted, an e-book producer scans an original hard copy and converts the image files into text with character recognition software.

The production of e-books is still an emerging industry, and as such there is not even a median annual salary to report. However, anyone who enters the field is seizing a ground-floor opportunity in what’s almost certain to be the future of publishing.

Robot Programmer

Decades ago, when people daydreamed about future technological advances, the hypothetical gadgets and toys varied from one person’s imagination to the next. However, there was always consensus about one thing: In the future, we would all have robots in our homes to cook our meals, clean our homes and walk our dogs.Sadly, this utopia never came to pass. However, robots are still used in numerous industries, such as manufacturing, and someone has to program them to perform their tasks. The robot p
Matt J. Carbone

Decades ago, when people daydreamed about future technological advances, the hypothetical gadgets and toys varied from one person’s imagination to the next. However, there was always consensus about one thing: In the future, we would all have robots in our homes to cook our meals, clean our homes and walk our dogs.

Sadly, this utopia never came to pass. However, robots are still used in numerous industries, such as manufacturing, and someone has to program them to perform their tasks. The robot programmer does most of this work from behind a computer console with a remote control in hand, and the annual salary can go as high as $100,000.

Headline Optimizer

Long ago, writing a headline was a job that had only two requirements: it had to be clear and it had to be brief. Brevity was almost more important than clarity, because it allowed the headline to be displayed in screaming, 72-point typeface on the cover of newspapers, guaranteeing that it would be noticed.Today, with online news, typeface size is irrelevant. What matters now is how many times the headline is returned as a Google search result. Enter the headline optimizer, who not only ensures
Winston Davidian | Photodisc | Getty Images

Long ago, writing a headline was a job that had only two requirements: it had to be clear and it had to be brief. Brevity was almost more important than clarity, because it allowed the headline to be displayed in screaming, 72-point typeface on the cover of newspapers, guaranteeing that it would be noticed.

Today, with online news, typeface size is irrelevant. What matters now is how many times the headline is returned as a Google search result. Enter the headline optimizer, who not only ensures that the headline in question is accurate and understandable, but also knows what keywords to use to make sure it’s seen by the largest number of people. For this profession, knowledge of search engine optimization (SEO) technology is a must.

Biomedical Engineer

The medical field has served as a proving ground for new technologies many times. Biomedical engineers merge medical science with engineering.
Jorge Dirkx | AFP | Getty Images

The medical field has served as a proving ground for new technologies many times. Biomedical engineers merge medical science with engineering to create the newest of these technologies, as well as improve on those that already exist.

The position requires, at minimum, a master’s degree in biology, chemistry, physics or engineering, but it’s worth the years of toil to enter such a continuously and rapidly growing field. An article in The New York Times estimated that the position offers a mean annual salary of $82,550.

Dermatologist

Dermatologists specialize in skin care, which can mean anything from recommending hypoallergenic creams to applying painful skin peels to injecting Botox. This industry is growing with no end in sight. . theorized that the increase in sales is attributable to the Baby Boomers, whom they believe are not taking the aging process lying down. They credit this generation with single-handedly subsidizing the current boom time for skin care specialists.
Assembly | Blend Images | Getty Images

Dermatologists specialize in skin care, which can mean anything from recommending hypoallergenic creams to applying painful skin peels to injecting Botox. This industry is growing with no end in sight. Anti-aging skin products increased in sales from 2006 to 2008 by 13%, and that figure is expected to go up yet again, this time by another 20% by the year 2013.

The New York Times theorized that the increase in sales is attributable to the Baby Boomers, whom they believe are not taking the aging process lying down. They credit this generation with single-handedly subsidizing the current boom time for skin care specialists.

Information Engineer

”Information engineer” is a job title that didn’t exist even a few years ago, and today it’s a position that’s found almost exclusively in web-based companies. While there’s no shortage of software on the market that analyzes every last piece of data a company can generate, the engineer makes sense of these findings and extrapolates what it means for the company in real, human terms.The engineer identifies the reasons behind trends. For example, software can easily tabulate the number of employe
Thomas Northcut | Digital Vision | Getty Images

”Information engineer” is a job title that didn’t exist even a few years ago, and today it’s a position that’s found almost exclusively in web-based companies. While there’s no shortage of software on the market that analyzes every last piece of data a company can generate, the engineer makes sense of these findings and extrapolates what it means for the company in real, human terms.

The engineer identifies the reasons behind trends. For example, software can easily tabulate the number of employees that have quit a company within a particular amount of time, but the engineer is the one who pores over the numbers to find the actual reasons behind the rate of churn. This position can pay as much as $120,000 a year.

Medical Scientist

It may at first seem strange to see “medical scientist” on a list of jobs for Millennials, since it’s been around for a very long time. However, Millennials are looking for stable work in growing fields just like anyone else, and thanks to a combination of easy access to quick international travel and overpopulation, the rapid, worldwide spread of disease should keep medical scientists employed for the foreseeable future.Medical scientists design medicines to combat the threat of new diseases. A
PhotoAlto | Eric Audras | Getty Images

It may at first seem strange to see “medical scientist” on a list of jobs for Millennials, since it’s been around for a very long time. However, Millennials are looking for stable work in growing fields just like anyone else, and thanks to a combination of easy access to quick international travel and overpopulation, the rapid, worldwide spread of disease should keep medical scientists employed for the foreseeable future.

Medical scientists design medicines to combat the threat of new diseases. Anyone interested in this field should have a master’s degree in biology, bio-imaging or clinical investigation. The New York Times estimated that this field is growing at a healthy rate, and that it should create 44,000 new jobs by the year 2018.