‘Wealth work’ growing with U.S. economy

Private chefs, dog groomers in demand

WASHINGTON — Ken McNamee has an upfront view of the river of wealth cascading through Seattle these days.

A private chef, McNamee prospects for clients at the tony country club where he spends part of his week preparing luxe meals. The members include Bill Gates and Jeff Bezos.

On a visit to a potential client at a home on Lake Washington, not far from Gates’ house, McNamee encountered an indoor pool, two kitchens, a dumbwaiter and a trove of artwork.

“That,” he said, “was one of the only times I’ve been awed.”

One of the fastest-growing job categories of the past decade has been what David Autor, an economics professor at MIT, calls “wealth work”: catering to the whims and desires of affluent households.

The trend has coincided with the longest U.S. expansion on record, which recently surpassed the decade mark. That streak of growth — and the surging stock market gains that accompanied it — left the richest households with a greater proportion of America’s wealth than before the Great Recession began in 2007.

Most “wealth work” jobs aren’t quite as glamorous as McNamee’s. But they’re growing fast.

The number of massage therapist jobs has more than doubled in the past decade. So have manicurists and pedicurists. The number of private chefs has quintupled. A category that mostly consists of jobs walking and grooming dogs is up 60 percent.

Yet economists say most wealth jobs don’t benefit workers or the economy as much as traditional employment does. Most wealth workers are self-employed and lack employer-provided health insurance, retirement plans and other benefits. They often earn relatively low wages, and their incomes tend to fluctuate depending on how many clients they have. Nor do they have many opportunities to learn new skills, undergo advanced training or move up a career ladder.

“They contribute to this jittery, anxious moment,” said Mark Muro, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution. “It’s a boom that also feels precarious.”

In data analyzed exclusively for The Associated Press, Muro calculates there were 3.2 million wealth worker jobs in 2017, up from 2.8 million in 2010. These job have grown faster than such traditional occupations as sales, education, manufacturing and office administrative work.

Their pay averaged about $36,000 in 2017, far below the average for all occupations of $51,000.

Wealth positions hold one advantage: Because they require personal interaction, they are immune to the threat of automation and outsourcing.

“You can’t have someone spotting you on a weight bench from China,” said Lucas Puente, formerly the chief economist at Thumbtack, an online small-business marketplace.

The main growth driver for these jobs is the expansion of the uppermiddle class. Nearly 8 percent of U.S. households earned $200,000 or more in 2017, according to the Census Bureau. That figure is up from just below 6 percent in 2007, adjusted for inflation.

Ted S. Warren The Associated Press Ken McNamee, a private chef in Seattle, is finding work by pitching himself to members of a posh country club where he also works. The club’s members include Bill Gates and Jeff Bezos.