Careers / Jewelers and Precious Stone and Metal Workers

Jewelers and Precious Stone and Metal Workers — Career Decision Dashboard

United States

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Median annual wage

$52,540

United States, 2025

Employment

22,440

United States, 2025

Typical education

High School Diploma or the equivalent (such as a GED)

Job Zone 3

Skills identified

35

10 related careers

Career overview

Design, fabricate, adjust, repair, or appraise jewelry, gold, silver, other precious metals, or gems.

O*NET code
51-9071.00
Job zone
3
Experience required
Over 4 years, up to and including 6 years

Typical tasks

  • Clean and polish metal items and jewelry pieces, using jewelers' tools, polishing wheels, and chemical baths.
  • Smooth soldered joints and rough spots, using hand files and emery paper, and polish smoothed areas with polishing wheels or buffing wire.
  • Create jewelry from materials such as gold, silver, platinum, and precious or semiprecious stones.
  • Cut and file pieces of jewelry such as rings, brooches, bracelets, and lockets.
  • Examine assembled or finished products to ensure conformance to specifications, using magnifying glasses or precision measuring instruments.
  • Make repairs, such as enlarging or reducing ring sizes, soldering pieces of jewelry together, and replacing broken clasps and mountings.
  • Compute costs of labor and materials to determine production costs of products and articles.
  • Position stones and metal pieces, and set, mount, and secure items in place, using setting and hand tools.

Choose a location

Salary analysis — United States

$35,580
10th
$39,520
25th
$52,540
Median
$69,810
75th
$87,540
90th

10th percentile

$35,580

25th percentile

$39,520

75th percentile

$69,810

90th percentile

$87,540

Most important skills

  • Active Listening3.1
  • Speaking3.0
  • Critical Thinking3.0
  • Social Perceptiveness2.9
  • Judgment and Decision Making2.9
  • Coordination2.9
  • Monitoring2.8
  • Reading Comprehension2.8
  • Complex Problem Solving2.6
  • Time Management2.6
  • Service Orientation2.6
  • Instructing2.5

What skills do you need?

Select the skills you already have

Skills listed are those O*NET rates at importance 3.0 or above for this occupation. Set your own level on the same 0–7 O*NET scale.

Skill coverage

0%

0 of 3 identified skills

Matched

0

Missing

3

Your selected skills cover approximately 0% of the skills identified for this occupation in O*NET. This is a coverage measure of listed skills only — it is not a qualification, hiring or interview outcome.

Skills to develop

SkillImportanceRequired levelYour levelGap
Critical Thinking3.03.5Not selected3.5
Active Listening3.12.9Not selected2.9
Speaking3.02.8Not selected2.8

Ordered by required level gap multiplied by O*NET importance. No prediction or recommendation is implied.

Related careers

How salary varies by location

LocationMedianEmploymentYear
Bridgeport, CT$82,200502025
San Francisco, CA$75,6402402025
Scranton, PA$73,800402025
Kiryas Joel, NY$73,650502025
Albany, NY$71,410402025
CT$69,8001402025
Washington, DC$65,3701102025
San Jose, CA$64,740702025
San Diego, CA$64,6202602025
Durham, NC$63,650502025
Ann Arbor, MI$62,970402025
Madison, WI$62,700302025
Sacramento, CA$62,450502025
Charlotte, NC$62,4002302025
VA$61,9402402025
NY$61,7204,3002025
New York, NY$61,3604,4402025
Los Angeles, CA$61,1501,1902025
Raleigh, NC$61,0001202025
CA$60,7902,3002025
All locations with published data

Career transition paths

Compare the skills of a career you hold today with Jewelers and Precious Stone and Metal Workers to see shared skills, target-only skills and skill overlap.

Build a transition comparison

Career and skills data: O*NET 31.0.

Salary and employment data: U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, OEWS, 2025 (May 2025 release).

Figures are periodic published survey snapshots, not real-time market rates.