AI exposure: Cargo and Freight Agents
Expedite and route movement of incoming and outgoing cargo and freight shipments in airline, train, and trucking terminals and shipping docks. Take orders from customers and arrange pickup of freight and cargo for delivery to loading platform. Prepare and examine bills of lading to determine shipping charges and tariffs.
Reading this score
computedCargo and Freight Agents sits in the top 3% of every occupation measured. 63.3% of what this job consists of, weighted by how important each task is to the role, is work current AI systems can produce with little standing in the way. Very few occupations score this high. The ones that do tend to share a trait: the output is a document, a calculation or a message, and nobody has to be in a particular room for it to count.
No single friction dominates this occupation. The strongest is embodiment at 1.33 out of 3 and the weakest is presence at 0.38, which is a narrow spread. Where nothing structural stands in the way, exposure tracks capability almost directly, and capability is the thing that changes every quarter.
The most exposed thing this job does is Estimate freight or postal rates and record shipment costs and weights, at 93.3%. The least is Open cargo containers and unwrap contents, at 0.0%. A gap of 93.3% between two parts of the same job is the reason this index publishes at task level. An occupation-wide number would have hidden both.
Within office and administrative support occupations, this one is more exposed than most. The median across the 51 roles in the group is 54.6%, and only 9 of them score higher than this. Occupational families are not uniform, and the spread inside them is often wider than the gap between them.
What would move this score. Of 24 tasks, 13 are currently banded exposed, 1 assisted and 10 untouched. For that distribution to shift materially would take capability alone, since there is little structural friction here to slow adoption once a system can do the work. The score is re-computed every quarter against a fresh capability reference, and the change is published rather than quietly applied.
Task by task
24 tasks, O*NET 31.0| Task | Exposed | Assisted | Untouched | Importance | Band |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Estimate freight or postal rates and record shipment costs and weights. | 93.3% | 6.7% | 0.0% | 3.41 | exposed |
| Notify consignees, passengers, or customers of freight or baggage arrival and arrange for delivery. | 93.3% | 6.7% | 0.0% | 3.30 | exposed |
| Enter shipping information into a computer by hand or by a hand-held scanner that reads bar codes on goods. | 86.7% | 13.3% | 0.0% | 3.04 | exposed |
| Determine method of shipment and prepare bills of lading, invoices, and other shipping documents. | 80.0% | 20.0% | 0.0% | 3.72 | exposed |
| Track delivery progress of shipments. | 80.0% | 20.0% | 0.0% | 3.57 | exposed |
| Advise clients on transportation and payment methods. | 80.0% | 20.0% | 0.0% | 3.47 | exposed |
| Keep records of all goods shipped, received, and stored. | 80.0% | 20.0% | 0.0% | 3.31 | exposed |
| Retrieve stored items and trace lost shipments as necessary. | 80.0% | 20.0% | 0.0% | 3.09 | exposed |
| Check import or export documentation to determine cargo contents and use tariff coding system to classify goods according to fee or tariff group. | 80.0% | 20.0% | 0.0% | 3.28 | exposed |
| Prepare manifests showing numbers of airplane passengers and baggage, mail, and freight weights, transmitting data to destinations. | 73.3% | 26.7% | 0.0% | 3.51 | exposed |
| Arrange insurance coverage for goods. | 45.0% | 30.0% | 25.0% | 3.45 | exposed |
| Contact vendors or claims adjustment departments to resolve shipment problems or contact service depots to arrange for repairs. | 45.0% | 30.0% | 25.0% | 3.22 | exposed |
| Maintain a supply of packing materials. | 30.0% | 20.0% | 50.0% | 2.65 | exposed |
| Direct or participate in cargo loading to ensure completeness of load and even distribution of weight. | 27.5% | 10.0% | 62.5% | 2.64 | untouched |
| Negotiate and arrange transport of goods with shipping or freight companies. | 25.0% | 25.0% | 50.0% | 3.86 | assisted |
| Inspect and count items received and check them against invoices or other documents, recording shortages and rejecting damaged goods. | 15.8% | 9.2% | 75.0% | 3.16 | untouched |
| Coordinate and supervise activities of workers engaged in packing and shipping merchandise. | 13.3% | 11.7% | 75.0% | 3.23 | untouched |
| Route received goods to first available flight or to appropriate storage areas or departments, using forklifts, hand trucks, or other equipment. | 11.7% | 13.3% | 75.0% | 3.14 | untouched |
| Install straps, braces, and padding to loads to prevent shifting or damage during shipment. | 0.0% | 0.0% | 100.0% | 3.41 | untouched |
| Direct delivery trucks to shipping doors or designated marshaling areas and help load and unload goods safely. | 0.0% | 0.0% | 100.0% | 3.00 | untouched |
| Assemble containers and crates used to transport items, such as machines or vehicles. | 0.0% | 0.0% | 100.0% | 2.96 | untouched |
| Pack goods for shipping, using tools such as staplers, strapping machines, and hammers. | 0.0% | 0.0% | 100.0% | 2.63 | untouched |
| Attach address labels, identification codes, and shipping instructions to containers. | 0.0% | 0.0% | 100.0% | 2.56 | untouched |
| Open cargo containers and unwrap contents, using steel cutters, crowbars, or other hand tools. | 0.0% | 0.0% | 100.0% | 2.51 | untouched |
Task text and importance ratings sourced from O*NET 31.0. Shares computed. The occupation score is the importance-weighted mean. 8 task(s) lacked a usable O*NET weight and are shown but excluded from the weighting.
Where the score comes from
judgedEvery task is scored through the standardised work activities it maps to. These are this occupation’s averages on the six rubric dimensions. Capability is what AI can do; the other five are what stands in the way.
| Dimension | Mean | Scale |
|---|---|---|
| Capability | 2.27 | 0-4 |
| Embodiment | 1.33 | 0-3 |
| Presence | 0.38 | 0-3 |
| Accountability | 0.62 | 0-3 |
| Context | 1.04 | 0-3 |
| Verification cost | 0.67 | 0-3 |
What this means in practice
Where most of a role's weighted task load is exposed, the work that survives is usually the part of the job nobody wrote into the job description: deciding what should be produced rather than producing it, and being answerable for the result. The tasks lowest on this page are a better guide to where to spend your time than any general advice about the future of work.
Occupations either side of this one
The four closest scores in the same occupational family, then the four closest anywhere in the index.
Read this carefully. Exposure is not displacement. A high score means current AI systems can produce this work, not that anyone will stop paying a person to do it. Adoption depends on economics, regulation and inertia that this index deliberately does not model. How the score is built.