Career
Dining room and cafeteria attendants and bartender helpers
Keep dining rooms clean and service moving.
$33,980
Median pay
+5.3%
Job growth, 2025–35
95,300
Openings a year
No formal educational credential
Typical education
None required
Typical time after high school
Here's what you actually need to know.
The work
What people in this job do
- Run cash registers.
- Serve ice water, coffee, rolls, or butter to patrons.
- Scrape and stack dirty dishes and carry dishes and other tableware to kitchens for cleaning.
- Wipe tables or seats with dampened cloths or replace dirty tablecloths.
- Set tables with clean linens, condiments, or other supplies.
The outlook
How the forecast changed this year
The deeper question
What kind of person does this path ask you to become?
What this work centers on
O*NET interest profile, scored 1–7.
The work
Do you want most of your days spent on objects & tools, then information & systems?
Responsibility
Are you willing to be the one responsible for this?
“Run cash registers.”
Development
What would you need to build over the next 5–10 years?
Active Listening, Coordination, Service Orientation, Monitoring.
Trade-offs
What does it ask of you in exchange?
No degree beyond high school, though short-term on-the-job training is typical, for a median of $33,980 a year and 95,300 openings nationally each year.
Paths in
Degrees that lead here
- NO MATCHCIP 99.9999
Paths across
Careers that use similar skills
- Food Servers, Nonrestaurant$35,360 · +4.5%
- Fast Food and Counter Workers$31,200 · +5.8%
- Waiters and Waitresses$35,230 · +2.0%
- Food Preparation Workers$35,320 · -3.0%
- Hosts and Hostesses, Restaurant, Lounge, and Coffee Shop$31,200 · +3.4%
Ask anything about this career.
“Would this make sense if I don't want to sit at a desk all day?” Answers will come from the sources on this page, with citations. Coming soon.
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Sources
- BLS Employment Projections, 2025–35, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. Retrieved 2026-10-01.
- BLS Employment Projections, 2024–34 (archived), U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. Retrieved 2026-10-01.
- O*NET 31.0 Database (August 2026), National Center for O*NET Development / U.S. Department of Labor. Retrieved 2026-10-01.
- CIP 2020 to SOC 2018 Crosswalk, NCES and BLS. Retrieved 2026-10-01.