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| Median Wage (USD, 2025) | Projected Job Openings (2025-2035) | Projected Growth (2025-2035) | |
|---|---|---|---|
| National Statistics | $52540 | 4000 | -5.4% |
| State Statistics | - | - | - |
| City Statistics | - | - | - |
Experience Requirements Overview
- Job Zone Three: Medium Preparation Needed
- Previous work-related skill, knowledge, or experience is required for these occupations. For example, an electrician must have completed three or four years of apprenticeship or several years of vocational training, and often must have passed a licensing exam, in order to perform the job.
- Most occupations in this zone require training in vocational schools, related on-the-job experience, or an associate's degree.
- Employees in these occupations usually need one or two years of training involving both on-the-job experience and informal training with experienced workers. A recognized apprenticeship program may be associated with these occupations.
Education, Training and Experience
Required Level of Education: Post-Secondary Certificate
Related Work Experience: Over 1 year, up to and including 2 years
On-Site or In-Plant Training: Over 6 months, up to and including 1 year
On-the-Job Training: Over 6 months, up to and including 1 year
Detailed Work Activities
- Examine physical characteristics of gemstones or precious metals.
- Evaluate quality of materials or products.
- Determine the value of goods or services.
- Record operational or production data.
- Advise others on ways to improve processes or products.
Work Values
Achievement
Occupations that satisfy this work value are results oriented and allow employees to use their strongest abilities, giving them a feeling of accomplishment. Corresponding needs are Ability Utilization and Achievement.
Working Conditions
Recognition
Relationships
Support
Independence
Tasks
- Assign polish, symmetry, and clarity grades to stones, according to established grading systems.
- Identify and document stones' clarity characteristics, using plot diagrams.
- Estimate wholesale and retail value of gems, following pricing guides, market fluctuations, and other relevant economic factors.
- Examine gems during processing to ensure accuracy of angles and positions of cuts or bores, using magnifying glasses, loupes, or shadowgraphs.
- Examine diamonds or gems to ascertain the shape, cut, and width of cut stones, or to select the cuts that will result in the biggest, best quality stones.
- Examine gem surfaces and internal structures, using polariscopes, refractometers, microscopes, and other optical instruments, to differentiate between stones, to identify rare specimens, or to detect flaws, defects, or peculiarities affecting gem values.
- Advise customers and others on the best use of gems to create attractive jewelry items.
- Locate and mark drilling or cutting positions on stones or dies, using diamond chips and power hand tools.
- Secure gems or diamonds in holders, chucks, dops, lapidary sticks, or blocks for cutting, polishing, grinding, drilling, or shaping.
- Select shaping wheels for tasks, and mix and apply abrasives, bort, or polishing compounds.
- Measure sizes of stones' bore holes and cuts to ensure adherence to specifications, using precision measuring instruments.
- Sort rough diamonds into categories based on shape, size, color, and quality.
- Place stones in clamps on polishing machines and polish facets of stones, using felt-covered or canvas-covered polishing wheels and polishing compounds such as tripoli and rouge.
- Hold stones, gems, dies, or styluses against rotating plates, wheels, saws, or slitters to cut, shape, slit, grind, or polish them.
- Replace, true, and sharpen blades, drills, and plates.
- Secure stones in metal mountings, using solder.
- Immerse stones in prescribed chemical solutions to determine specific gravities and key properties of gemstones or substitutes.
- Regrind drill points, and advance drill cutting points according to specifications for channel depths and shapes.
- Split gems along pre-marked lines to remove imperfections, using blades and jewelers' hammers.
- Lap girdles on rough diamonds, using diamond girdling lathes.
- Dismantle lapping, boring, cutting, polishing, and shaping equipment and machinery to clean and lubricate it.
- Regulate the speed of revolutions and reciprocating actions of drilling mechanisms.
Work Styles
Innovation
A tendency to be inventive, to be imaginative, and to adopt new perspectives on ways to accomplish work.
Achievement Orientation
Intellectual Curiosity
Tolerance for Ambiguity
Initiative
Adaptability
Self-Confidence
Perseverance
Leadership Orientation
Humility
Sincerity
Empathy
Cooperation
Optimism
Social Orientation
Cautiousness
Attention to Detail
Dependability
Integrity
Stress Tolerance
Self-Control
Data Source: This page includes information from the O*NET 31.0 Database by the U.S. Department of Labor, Employment and Training Administration (USDOL/ETA). Used under the CC BY 4.0 license. O*NET® is a trademark of USDOL/ETA. This page includes Employment Projections program, Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics program, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics.