How’s Your Heart Rate? The Most and Least Stressful Jobs of 2014

By Catherine Clifford Jan 10, 2014

Opinions expressed by Entrepreneur contributors are their own.

Work is part of life, but stress doesn’t have to be.

Job-search website CareerCast.com released its rankings of the most and least stressful jobs of 2014. The rankings take into account the physical demands of a job, the environmental conditions, whether a person’s own life is in danger, whether a person’s job requires him or her to take responsibility for the lives of others and the degree of involvement a person has with the public.

Related: 10 Easy Ways to Minimize Stress

Perhaps unsurprisingly, the two most stressful jobs are related to the military. Other jobs that topped the stress ranking include firefighter and airline pilot.

Overall, it takes a bit more time in the classroom to nail a job in the less stressful category, CareerCast.com notes. The least stressful job is an audiologist, followed by a number of professions geared toward improving appearance: hair stylist, jeweler and seamstress or tailor.

Related: How to Manage the Stress of Uncertainty

If you are looking to revamp your professional life, be sure to take into account your own threshold for and desire of stress on a daily basis. Here are the top 10 most and least stressful jobs of 2014.

Most Stressful Jobs (Ranked high to low)
1. Enlisted Military Personnel
2. Military General
3. Firefighter
4. Airline Pilot
5. Event Coordinator
6. Public Relations Executive
7. Senior Corporate Executive
8. Newspaper Reporter
9. Police Officer
10. Taxi Driver

Least Stressful Jobs (Ranked low to high)
1. Audiologist
2. Hair Stylist
3. Jeweler
4. Tenured University Professor
5. Seamstress or tailor
6. Dietitian
7. Medical Records Technician
8. Librarian
9. Multimedia Artist
10. Drill-press operator

Work is part of life, but stress doesn’t have to be.

Job-search website CareerCast.com released its rankings of the most and least stressful jobs of 2014. The rankings take into account the physical demands of a job, the environmental conditions, whether a person’s own life is in danger, whether a person’s job requires him or her to take responsibility for the lives of others and the degree of involvement a person has with the public.

Related: 10 Easy Ways to Minimize Stress

The rest of this article is locked.

Join Entrepreneur+ today for access.

Subscribe Now

Already have an account? Sign In

Catherine Clifford

Senior Entrepreneurship Writer at CNBC
Catherine Clifford is senior entrepreneurship writer at CNBC. She was formerly a senior writer at Entrepreneur.com, the small business reporter at CNNMoney and an assistant in the New York bureau for CNN. Clifford attended Columbia University where she earned a bachelor's degree. She lives in Brooklyn, N.Y. You can follow her on Twitter at @CatClifford.

Related Content