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Surgical Assistants vs Licensed Practical and Licensed Vocational Nurses

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

A factual, source-backed comparison of Surgical Assistants and Licensed Practical and Licensed Vocational Nurses 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.”

Surgical Assistants Licensed Practical and Licensed Vocational Nurses
Median pay · BLS OEWS
$60,290
$62,340
Employment · BLS OEWS
22,860
632,430
AI exposure (percentile) · task overlap, not automation
2nd pct
6th pct

At a glance

Dimension Surgical Assistants Licensed Practical and Licensed Vocational Nurses
Median pay $60,290 $62,340
Employment 22,860 632,430
Employment outlook (2024–34) · BLS projection About average (+5.1%) About average (+2.6%)
Annual openings · BLS projection 1,600 54,400
Typical education · O*NET Most occupations in this zone require training in vocational schools, related on-the-job experience, or an associate's degree. Most occupations in this zone require training in vocational schools, related on-the-job experience, or an associate's degree.
AI exposure · published exposure studies Low · 2nd pct Low · 6th pct
Global GenAI gradient · ILO ISCO-08 · via crosswalk — 39th pct · 22% of tasks
Observed AI use · Anthropic Economic Index — Augmentation-leaning (37.8%)
Mostly remote-capable · Dingel–Neiman — 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: Medicine and Dentistry, Oral Comprehension, Active Listening, Near Vision, Customer and Personal Service, Oral Expression, Problem Sensitivity, Speech Clarity, Speaking, Written Comprehension, Speech Recognition, Reading Comprehension, Critical Thinking, Monitoring, Information Ordering, English Language, Deductive Reasoning, Inductive Reasoning, Coordination, Service Orientation, Education and Training, Complex Problem Solving, Written Expression, Flexibility of Closure, Writing, Learning Strategies, Social Perceptiveness, Judgment and Decision Making, Category Flexibility.

Specific to Surgical Assistants

  • Arm-Hand Steadiness
  • Finger Dexterity
  • Visual Color Discrimination
  • Control Precision
  • Selective Attention
  • Manual Dexterity
  • Biology
  • Perceptual Speed

Specific to Licensed Practical and Licensed Vocational Nurses

  • Psychology
  • Time Management
  • Active Learning
  • Administration and Management
  • Instructing
  • Static Strength
  • Trunk Strength
  • Therapy and Counseling

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

Shared: Medical software , Spreadsheet software , Office suite software .

Specific to Surgical Assistants

Specific to Licensed Practical and Licensed Vocational Nurses

Full profiles

This page is a summary. See the complete source-backed profile for Surgical Assistants or Licensed Practical and Licensed Vocational Nurses — 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. "Surgical Assistants vs Licensed Practical and Licensed Vocational Nurses." 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/surgical-assistants-vs-licensed-practical-and-licensed-vocational-nurses

APA

Singulariki. (2026). Surgical Assistants vs Licensed Practical and Licensed Vocational Nurses. Singulariki: a source-backed encyclopedia of work. Retrieved June 7, 2026, from https://singulariki.com/compare/surgical-assistants-vs-licensed-practical-and-licensed-vocational-nurses

BibTeX 
@misc{singulariki-surgical-assistants-vs-licensed-practical-and-licensed-vocational-nurses,
  title  = {Surgical Assistants vs Licensed Practical and Licensed Vocational Nurses},
  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/surgical-assistants-vs-licensed-practical-and-licensed-vocational-nurses}
}

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