Will AI replace Reinforcing Iron and Rebar Workers?
AI reaches little of this job’s work.
0/100
Low exposure
More exposed to AI than 2% of US workers.
- AI already used in
- 0% of the work
- As AI tools mature: up to
- 0% of the work
What the job involves
Position and secure steel bars or mesh in concrete forms in order to reinforce concrete. Use a variety of fasteners, rod-bending machines, blowtorches, and hand tools. Includes rod busters.
Where AI reaches the work
The job’s main tasks, heaviest first, by how far AI reaches them.
Out of reach(7)
- Position and secure steel bars, rods, cables, or mesh in concrete forms, using fasteners, rod-bending machines, blowtorches, or hand tools.
- Determine quantities, sizes, shapes, and locations of reinforcing rods from blueprints, sketches, or oral instructions.
- Space and fasten together rods in forms according to blueprints, using wire and pliers.
- Cut rods to required lengths, using metal shears, hacksaws, bar cutters, or acetylene torches.
- Cut and fit wire mesh or fabric, using hooked rods, and position fabric or mesh in concrete to reinforce concrete.
and 2 more
Also called
Rodbuster · Rod Buster · Steel Tier · Field Ironworker · Iron Installer · Iron Worker · Ironworker · Ironworker Journeyman
Related jobs
What these numbers mean
The score is the share of this job’s work, weighted by how important and frequent each task is, that AI could do in half the time: tasks an AI model could do alone count in full, tasks that need software built on AI count half.
“AI already used” is the share of the work in tasks where people are recorded using AI today. “As AI tools mature” counts every task AI could halve, with or without extra software.
The percentile compares the score with every job’s, weighted by how many people in the US do each one. Exposure means AI could change how the work is done, not that the job goes away. These are estimates for the typical job, not predictions.
Sources
- O*NET 31.0 Database, U.S. Department of Labor, Employment and Training Administration
- GPTs are GPTs: Labor market impact potential of LLMs (task labels), Eloundou, Manning, Mishkin & Rock (2023), OpenAI and University of Pennsylvania
- Anthropic Economic Index: labor market impacts (task penetration), Anthropic
- Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics, May 2025 (national and metropolitan areas), U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics