Skip to content
man bot

Elementary occupations · code 9411

Fast food preparers

Fast food preparers prepare and cook to order a limited range of foods or beverages that involve simple preparation processes and a small number of ingredients. They may take orders from customers and serve at counters or tables. Tasks include - (a) preparing simple or pre-prepared foods and beverages such as sandwiches, hamburgers, pizzas, fish and chips, salads and coffee; (b) washing, cutting, measuring and mixing foods for cooking; (c) operating large-volume single-process cooking equipment such as grills, deep-fat fryers or griddles; (d) re-heating pre-prepared food; (e) cleaning food preparation areas, cooking surfaces and utensils; (f) taking and serving food and beverage orders in eating places that specialize in fast service and carry-out food; (g) ordering and taking delivery of fast food ingredients; (h) maintaining sanitation, health and safety standards in work areas; (i) verifying that prepared food meets requirements for quality and quantity. Examples of the occupations classified here: - Fast food cook - Hamburger maker - Pizza maker - Short order cook Some related occupations classified elsewhere: - Chef - 3434 - Cook - 5120 - Food service counter attendant - 5246 Note Jobs that combine preparation of simple food items with taking orders, serving clients and calculating or receiving payment should be classified in Unit Group 5246: Food Service Counter Attendants, unless client service is an incidental component of the work.

None of this job's tasks scored high enough to count. It ranks 123 of 427 for holding up against AI.

Also known as

  • pizzaiolo
  • quick service restaurant crew member

Job titles from the EU's ESCO list. Search for any of them on the jobs page and you'll end up here.

81.7
Holds up
against AI Not Exposed

AI could take on 18.3 of 100, on average
so it holds up at 100 − 18.3 = 81.7

That's the whole sum, and you can check it against the ILO's study.

41.5
How hands-on
out of 100

From O*NET, averaged across 2 US jobs

35.1
How fiddly
and cramped

finger skill 34.9 · hand skill 41.1 · cramped spaces 29.3 · averaged

Kind of hands-on work · hands-on under 50 Less than half hands-on

Less than half of this job is hands-on. Robots still matter, but for a smaller part of the work, so we don't sort it any further.

estimated O*NET 31.0 BLS occupational crosswalk chain ISCO-08 to 2010 SOC (Aug 2012, rev. Jun 2015); 2010 to 2018 SOC (Nov 2017); O*NET-SOC 2019 taxonomy data 0.7-work-setting measures chosen by Frey & Osborne (2017) · the grouping is a sorting, not a measurement

What this number leaves out This job rates 41.5 out of 100 for how hands-on it is. The score above only looks at AI tools, not robots, but for work this far from the physical that matters less.

The tasks behind the score

The score is the average of these. A job is really a bundle of tasks, and an average can hide how uneven that bundle is.

The task AI could do most of scores 25, while the average is 18.3. A big gap means some of this job is wide open to AI and some of it barely at all. That's quite different from a job where everything sits somewhere in the middle, even when the averages match.

  1. 25

    Taking and serving food and beverage orders in eating places that specialize in fast service and carry-out food

    Low
  2. 23.5

    Ordering and taking delivery of fast food ingredients

    Very Low
  3. 22.5

    Maintaining sanitation, health, and safety standards in work areas

    Very Low
  4. 20.5

    Verifying that prepared food meets requirements for quality and quantity.

    Very Low
  5. 17

    Operating large-volume single-process cooking equipment such as grills, deep-fat fryers or griddles

    Very Low
  6. 15.5

    Preparing simple or pre-prepared foods and beverages such as sandwiches, hamburgers, pizzas, fish and chips, salads and coffee

    Very Low
  7. 14.5

    Washing, cutting, measuring and mixing foods for cooking

    Very Low
  8. 13.5

    Cleaning food preparation areas, cooking surfaces and utensils

    Very Low
  9. 12.8

    Re-heating pre-prepared food

    Very Low

9 tasks · the High to Very Low labels are the ILO's

from the source Working Paper 140, Generative AI and Jobs 2025 index data 0.7-work-setting

Helped, or replaced?

The score above can't tell a tool that makes you faster from one that does the task instead of you. Jobs and Skills Australia looked at those two things separately, and this is their result, matched to this job.

One Australian job matches this one closely, so this is about as reliable as it gets here.

AI helps you
56
AI does it for you
27

Helping wins by 29 points.

estimated Our Gen AI Transition (Gen AI Capacity Study) September 2025 detailed data release data 0.7-work-setting matched to Australian jobs 8511

Compared with similar jobs

There are 33 jobs in the “Elementary occupations” group, averaging 85.1. This one is below that.