Design and engineering
What does a Draughtsperson (CAD) do?
Working out how something should be built, and drawing it so others can build it.
What the day is like
- Indoors, under a roof.
- A screen and a keyboard.
- Largely on your own.
- Right or wrong, to a standard.
- The same shape each day.
- Answerable for your own work.
The facts
- Pay
- $68,090 a year, median
- Drafters, May 2025
- Usually needs
- Associate's degree
- A year or two, often while earning something.
- Jobs
- +1% projected change in jobs, 2025-2035 projections
- Demand looks steady
What is good about it
- You answer for your own work rather than for other people, which suits more people than admit it.
What people find hard about it
- Screen work all day
- Revisions
- Being at the end of other people’s decisions
Numbers are flat: software does more of this every year, so pair it with a trade or a specialism.
Will machines take this job?
What machines will do to this work. Drafting and routine calculation are automating; the responsibility for a design that has to stand up is not.
How to find out whether it suits you
Take a CAD course and redraw one real drawing to standard.
Would this actually suit you?
CareerDNA works that out from what you choose rather than from what you say about yourself: two minutes of choosing between real jobs, a few puzzles, and some questions about what you are like. It is free, it saves as you go, and it will tell you plainly where the answer is thin.