Slaughterers and Meat Packers
Agriculture, Food and Natural ResourcesO*NET 51-3023.00United States
Perform nonroutine or precision functions involving the preparation of large portions of meat. Work may include specialized slaughtering tasks, cutting standard or premium cuts of meat for marketing, making sausage, or wrapping meats.
- Median annual earnings
- $40,070
- Projected change
- +5.2%
- Typical education
- High school diploma or less
- Employment
- 71.27K jobs
50th percentile, United States
2025 to 2035
89.4% of the workforce
Growing to 75.01K by 2035
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The work
What slaughterers and meat packers do
Tasks reported for this occupation, ordered by how often they come up in the role.
- Remove bones, and cut meat into standard cuts in preparation for marketing.
- Sever jugular veins to drain blood and facilitate slaughtering.
- Tend assembly lines, performing a few of the many cuts needed to process a carcass.
- Shackle hind legs of animals to raise them for slaughtering or skinning.
- Slit open, eviscerate, and trim carcasses of slaughtered animals.
- Stun animals prior to slaughtering.
- Skin sections of animals or whole animals.
- Cut, trim, skin, sort, and wash viscera of slaughtered animals to separate edible portions from offal.
- Shave or singe and defeather carcasses, and wash them in preparation for further processing or packaging.
- Trim head meat, and sever or remove parts of animals' heads or skulls.
- Saw, split, or scribe carcasses into smaller portions to facilitate handling.
- Trim, clean, or cure animal hides.
- Grind meat into hamburger, and into trimmings used to prepare sausages, luncheon meats, and other meat products.
- Wrap dressed carcasses or meat cuts.
Pay and outlook
What the job pays and where it is heading
Annual earnings range
Reported earnings by percentile, United States
- 10th percentile
- $33,164
- 25th percentile
- $36,008
- 50th percentile
- $40,070
- 75th percentile
- $46,890
- 90th percentile
- $51,488
The gold marker shows the median. Half earn more than $40,070 and half earn less.
Employment outlook
2025 to 2035 projection
+5.2%average or slower
202571,269 jobs
2035 projected75,005 jobs
3,736 more positions over the decade, before replacement hiring.
Preparation
Education levels
What people currently working in the career hold. These are not entry requirements.
- High school diploma or less
- 89.4%
- Some college
- 10.6%
Skills
Skills employers ask for
Technical skills appearing most often in job postings for this occupation.
How the work gets done
Core competencies
Broad capabilities associated with strong performance in this occupation.
- Speaking
- Talking to others to convey information effectively.
- Active Listening
- Giving full attention to what other people are saying, taking time to understand the points being made, asking questions as appropriate, and not interrupting at inappropriate times.
- Critical Thinking
- Using logic and reasoning to identify the strengths and weaknesses of alternative solutions, conclusions, or approaches to problems.
- Social Perceptiveness
- Being aware of others' reactions and understanding why they react as they do.
- Operations Monitoring
- Watching gauges, dials, or other indicators to make sure a machine is working properly.
- Monitoring
- Monitoring/Assessing performance of yourself, other individuals, or organizations to make improvements or take corrective action.
- Operation and Control
- Controlling operations of equipment or systems.
- Quality Control Analysis
- Conducting tests and inspections of products, services, or processes to evaluate quality or performance.
- Troubleshooting
- Determining causes of operating errors and deciding what to do about it.
- Time Management
- Managing one's own time and the time of others.
- Coordination
- Adjusting actions in relation to others' actions.
- Judgment and Decision Making
- Considering the relative costs and benefits of potential actions to choose the most appropriate one.
- Service Orientation
- Actively looking for ways to help people.
- Active Learning
- Understanding the implications of new information for both current and future problem-solving and decision-making.
- Learning Strategies
- Selecting and using training/instructional methods and procedures appropriate for the situation when learning or teaching new things.
- Complex Problem Solving
- Identifying complex problems and reviewing related information to develop and evaluate options and implement solutions.
- Reading Comprehension
- Understanding written sentences and paragraphs in work-related documents.
- Instructing
- Teaching others how to do something.
- Management of Personnel Resources
- Motivating, developing, and directing people as they work, identifying the best people for the job.
- Systems Analysis
- Determining how a system should work and how changes in conditions, operations, and the environment will affect outcomes.
In the market
Job titles and employers
Recent job postings in United StatesCommon job titles
- 01Team Members785 postings
- 02National Team Members630 postings
- 03Meat Clerks581 postings
- 04Market Clerks462 postings
- 05Meat-Seafood Managers383 postings
- 06Meat Managers351 postings
- 07Fish Cutters341 postings
- 08Bakery Leads326 postings
- 09Production Leads261 postings
- 10Seafood Processors189 postings
- 11Hatchery Managers178 postings
- 12Harvest Managers165 postings
- 13Seafood Clerks159 postings
- 14Meat Wrappers144 postings
- 15Persons-in-Charge138 postings
- 16Trimmers136 postings
- 17Operators122 postings
- 18Cutters116 postings
- 19Meat Processors114 postings
- 20Food Production Supervisors111 postings
Top employers
- 01Dunkin' Donuts688 postings
- 02BJ's Wholesale Club504 postings
- 03Albertsons479 postings
- 04JBS Foods374 postings
- 05Pilgrim's Pride334 postings
- 06Fareway Stores330 postings
- 07Tyson Foods306 postings
- 08Coffee And Bagel Brands285 postings
- 09Wayne-Sanderson Farms270 postings
- 10Safeway267 postings
- 11Walmart262 postings
- 12The Fresh Market260 postings
- 13Harris Teeter232 postings
- 14Einstein Noah Restaurant Group226 postings
- 15Goodwill223 postings
- 16Sam's Club209 postings
- 17Aerotek192 postings
- 18Lowe's181 postings
- 19Brookshire Grocery Company157 postings
- 20Kroger154 postings
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