We can never know what someone else is going through without walking a mile in their shoes. This can also be true for the industries we know today. Number 25 really surprised us.
1. MLMs
We think this is a good thing. MLMs are businesses that involve selling products to family and friends and recruiting other people to do the same. These are called multi-level marketing (MLM), network marketing, or direct marketing businesses. Some MLMs are illegal pyramid schemes.
2. Emergency Medical Services
The people doing the work are largely extremely underpaid. For every place offering $86,000 starting, there’s 3-5 places trying to pay a critical care paramedic $18/hr.
3. Lineman For Powerlines
All the experience is retiring. It’s a huge change right now.
4. Live Music
People see big concerts happening and assume live music is doing pretty much as well as it always has. Not true. Small and medium-sized venues are struggling hard.
5. Agriculture Industry
The agriculture industry is struggling with a number of challenges, including climate change, rising temperatures, unpredictable rainfall, and extreme weather events, which are disrupting food production and threatening food security.
6. Retail Pharmacy
Some say the complete lack of PBM regulation and corporate greed is going to lead to massive closures across the country. Pharmacy workers appear to be the most overworked people on the planet, regardless of location.
7. Veterinary Medicine
Emotionally, it’s taxing, not just because you’re dealing with dying dogs every single day but because management are all business people nowadays and don’t know about medicine and blame you for not hitting quotas or overspending on supplies/overtime.
8. Dry Cleaners
Working from home and wearing more casual wear, some places may never go back to anywhere near the same volume.
9. The Nightlife Industry
Bars and Clubs in cities are dying; the high cost of living doesn’t help, and people put way less money in social activities. On the other hand, there never has been this many DJ’s or people who want to be a DJ.
10. Trucking
You would be scared to drive on the same road if you met some of these truck drivers. Up until COVID-19, you would have a bad driver come through once in a while; now, it’s rare to have a driver that understands basic instructions. How are they passing driver tests?
11. Teaching
They keep lowering the standards by 1-2% a year. It’s only terrifying when you look at the difference over a decade or more, which is what makes it so easy to ignore day-to-day.
12. Film and TV
Barely anything has been shooting, so most professionals are out of work. They are literally using the motto ‘Stay Alive Til 25’.
13. Hospitality
Some places used to be packed all weekend, but now they have nights on the weekend where they have more staff than customers. They used to never leave before midnight; now, they can be cleaning by 10 and having their shifties by 11.
14. The Auto Industry
However, they really did it to themselves. Too much inventory, and no one is buying the high-end trucks because they’re too pricey.
15. Customer Service
We honestly don’t think people realize how bad this is going to be in a generation. One of the reasons they want to go with AI is that service reps get burned out and exasperated after a few years.
16. Public Works
They are all wildly understaffed, and any applications they receive are wildly unqualified for the work. When roads, bridges, drainage, snow maintenance, etc, fail in the near future, there won’t be anyone to help.
17. Journalism
The world’s press is now just basically 3 prompt engineers and a premium chatgpt account. Serious concerns ought to be raised about the wellbeing of the 4th estate.
18. Broadway
There are rumors that Broadway is about to collapse. No one can afford the ticket costs anymore.
19. Luthier
Being a luthier in the US is about to get a whole lot more expensive if those tariffs end up being put in place. Pretty much every kind of wood used on violins, guitars, and other adjacent instruments is imported, not to mention all the tools you need.
20. The Hair Industry
The hair industry is starting to really suffer as the cost of supplies and living go up, yet wages aren’t increasing. Of course, people always need their hair cut, but root touch-ups are our bread and butter, and people can’t afford to get it done anymore.
21. Dairy Farmers
This is probably good news. Dairy farming has a disastrous impact on the environment, plus the cows aren’t much of a fan either.
22. Blood Banking
It’s a massive house of cards. We never have enough, juggling inventory across the country. It’s insane.
23. The Publishing Industry
One industry that’s struggling way more than people think is the publishing industry, especially print media. With the rise of digital content, social media, and free online news, traditional newspapers and magazines are finding it harder to compete.
24. The Tech Industry
It may be a surprise, but much of the tech industry is in a failing spot or at least on the decline. Especially in commodity tech (App Dev, Web Dev), people just don’t want to spend money right now. In larger tech companies, we’ve seen huge layoffs year over year (Google, Intel).
25. Tattooing
For a lot of reasons, but most understandably that people don’t have a bunch of disposable income right now. Traditionally, in difficult times, the industry hasn’t suffered too much because people enjoy new tattoo therapy when they’re struggling.
26. The Gaming Industry
This industry is continuing to implode. The interesting thing is that it’s for much different reasons than a lot of other industries. It was still affected by COVID simply because you couldn’t safely pack people into their offices like before, but by and large, the industry side didn’t change much after the lockdowns ended.
27. Child Care
“Make A Circle” is a documentary based on the struggles child care providers have faced, especially in recent years, and the difficulties they faced during COVID-19. Children are our future. The people who care for them shouldn’t be earning less than minimum wage with no paid leave, health care, or retirement.
28. Mortgage
No one is buying. No one is refinancing. And everyone wants a HELOC. Not everyone can get a heloc because they hurt their credit by maxing out their cards.
29. Therapy
It is expensive to be a therapist, you don’t get paid enough to be a therapist. There is too much demand and too little outreach for therapists. Moreover, mental illnesses are on the rise and fast, but no one’s pushing for changes in the mental health profession.
30. Higher Education In The US
Our elites and huge state schools are afloat, but midsize small privates and publics are struggling, and between enrollment drops and whatever the president’s administration will do, will force even more of these places to close or join larger systems.
