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Cooks, Short Order vs Food Servers, Nonrestaurant

Side-by-side · O*NET · BLS · AI-exposure research · Anthropic Economic Index

A factual, source-backed comparison of Cooks, Short Order and Food Servers, Nonrestaurant on the dimensions both occupations carry. Every figure is a position within an independent published dataset — not a verdict on which job is better, safer, or more “future-proof.”

Cooks, Short Order Food Servers, Nonrestaurant
Median pay · BLS OEWS
$35,620
$34,460
Employment · BLS OEWS
150,420
271,780
AI exposure (percentile) · task overlap, not automation
47th pct
37th pct

At a glance

Dimension Cooks, Short Order Food Servers, Nonrestaurant
Median pay $35,620 $34,460
Employment 150,420 271,780
Employment outlook (2024–34) · BLS projection Declining (-5.6%) About average (+3.0%)
Annual openings · BLS projection 20,600 48,000
Typical education · O*NET Usually requires a high school diploma or GED, though some occupations may not. Usually requires a high school diploma or GED, though some occupations may not.
AI exposure · published exposure studies Moderate · 47th pct Moderate · 37th pct
Global GenAI gradient · ILO ISCO-08 · via crosswalk 29th pct · 18% of tasks 47th pct · 26% of tasks
Observed AI use · Anthropic Economic Index Automation-leaning (31.8%) —
Mostly remote-capable · Dingel–Neiman No No

Pay and employment are BLS OEWS estimates; outlook and openings are BLS 2024–2034 projections; AI exposure and observed-use figures come from separate research and reflect exposure and usage, not predictions that either job will disappear. Compare like with like.

Skills

Shared: Food Production, Oral Comprehension, Near Vision, Customer and Personal Service, Trunk Strength, English Language, Reading Comprehension, Active Listening, Time Management, Information Ordering, Manual Dexterity, Speaking, Coordination, Service Orientation, Problem Sensitivity, Selective Attention, Arm-Hand Steadiness, Critical Thinking, Monitoring, Oral Expression, Far Vision, Speech Clarity, Written Comprehension, Deductive Reasoning, Extent Flexibility, Speech Recognition, Social Perceptiveness, Judgment and Decision Making, Inductive Reasoning.

Specific to Cooks, Short Order

  • Time Sharing
  • Finger Dexterity
  • Control Precision
  • Category Flexibility
  • Visual Color Discrimination
  • Complex Problem Solving
  • Perceptual Speed
  • Auditory Attention

Specific to Food Servers, Nonrestaurant

  • Administration and Management
  • Education and Training
  • Public Safety and Security
  • Mathematics
  • Psychology
  • Written Expression
  • Static Strength
  • Gross Body Coordination

Knowledge, skills & abilities O*NET rates as important for each occupation. “Shared” are common to both; the columns list what is distinctive to each (top by the order O*NET surfaces).

Tools & technology

Specific to Cooks, Short Order

Specific to Food Servers, Nonrestaurant

Full profiles

This page is a summary. See the complete source-backed profile for Cooks, Short Order or Food Servers, Nonrestaurant — tasks, the full skill graph, tools, work context, preparation, wages by percentile, industries, AI exposure and the AI work map.

More comparisons

Related occupations you can place side by side on the same sourced scale.

Sources for this page

Every figure above traces to a named public dataset and the exact release below — not hand-written opinion. See the full methodology for what each measure does and does not mean.

Data compiled June 2, 2026. Figures are estimates, not advice.

Cite this page
Plain

Singulariki. "Cooks, Short Order vs Food Servers, Nonrestaurant." Singulariki: a source-backed encyclopedia of work. Built from O*NET 30.3; BLS Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics (OEWS) May 2024; BLS Employment Projections 2024–2034; Anthropic Economic Index v4 (2026-01-15) + v2 (2025-03-27); Microsoft “Working with AI” working-with-ai; “GPTs are GPTs” (Eloundou et al.) arXiv 2303.10130; AI Occupational Exposure (AIOE) Felten, Raj & Seamans; ILO / Gmyrek et al. GenAI exposure gradient 2025; IBS O*NET-SOC ↔ ISCO-08 occupation crosswalk 2022; Frey & Osborne (2013) frey-osborne-automation; Dingel & Neiman (2020) dingel-neiman-workathome. Accessed June 7, 2026. https://singulariki.com/compare/cooks-short-order-vs-food-servers-nonrestaurant

APA

Singulariki. (2026). Cooks, Short Order vs Food Servers, Nonrestaurant. Singulariki: a source-backed encyclopedia of work. Retrieved June 7, 2026, from https://singulariki.com/compare/cooks-short-order-vs-food-servers-nonrestaurant

BibTeX 
@misc{singulariki-cooks-short-order-vs-food-servers-nonrestaurant,
  title  = {Cooks, Short Order vs Food Servers, Nonrestaurant},
  author = {{Singulariki}},
  year   = {2026},
  note   = {O*NET 30.3; BLS Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics (OEWS) May 2024; BLS Employment Projections 2024–2034; Anthropic Economic Index v4 (2026-01-15) + v2 (2025-03-27); Microsoft “Working with AI” working-with-ai; “GPTs are GPTs” (Eloundou et al.) arXiv 2303.10130; AI Occupational Exposure (AIOE) Felten, Raj & Seamans; ILO / Gmyrek et al. GenAI exposure gradient 2025; IBS O*NET-SOC ↔ ISCO-08 occupation crosswalk 2022; Frey & Osborne (2013) frey-osborne-automation; Dingel & Neiman (2020) dingel-neiman-workathome. Accessed June 7, 2026},
  url    = {https://singulariki.com/compare/cooks-short-order-vs-food-servers-nonrestaurant}
}

Citations name the underlying public dataset releases — they reflect what this page is built from, not just the URL.