Some of the best paying and best prospective occupations in Idaho are associated with bringing ideas into reality – creating prototypes and manufacturing the product for the market.

Domingo Angeles from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics provides a national perspective on these occupations and their outlook. While Angeles uses the design and manufacture of automobiles as his example, Idaho companies engaged in the manufacturing and design of all manner of products pull together the same mix of occupations to staff the teams that put in the hard, collaborative work to bring ideas to market.

In Angeles’ article, he identified careers related to developing prototypes include software developers, graphic designers, mechanical and electrical engineers and industrial designers. Table 1 provides employment, wage, projected openings and typical education levels for each occupation on a national level.

Table 1a shows similar data for Idaho.

The occupations identified in producing the product were identified as team assemblers, electricians, computer-controlled machine tool operators — metal and plastic — industrial machinery mechanics and industrial engineers.

Table 2  shows employment, wage, projected openings and typical education levels for each occupation on a national level. See Table 2a for corresponding data for Idaho.

Find the full article, “From protoype to production: Careers that bring ideas into being” on the U.S. BLS website to read more about the nationwide career outlook on these occupations.