First-Line Supervisors of Retail Sales Workers vs Demonstrators and Product Promoters
First-Line Supervisors of Retail Sales Workers carries the higher exposed share at 41.1% against 38.0%, a gap of 3.1 points. The difference is driven by both capability and friction: the two jobs differ in what a system can produce and in what stops it, by roughly the same amount. Release v2026.Q3.
| Occupation | Exposed | Assisted | Untouched | Capability | Friction | Median pay | Rank | Band |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| First-Line Supervisors of Retail Sales Workers | 41.1% | 21.8% | 37.1% | 0.63 | 0.38 | $48,520 | 254 | exposed |
| Demonstrators and Product Promoters | 38.0% | 13.4% | 48.5% | 0.51 | 0.28 | $39,320 | 305 | exposed |
What stands in the way, in each
First-Line Supervisors of Retail Sales Workers: the dominant friction is that it runs on knowledge of the organisation that a model cannot hold. Capability sits at 0.63 of 1 and friction at 0.38 of 1.
Demonstrators and Product Promoters: the dominant friction is that the work happens to physical things in physical places. Capability sits at 0.51 of 1 and friction at 0.28 of 1.
Capability asks whether a generally available system can produce the work product at all. Friction asks what stops it finishing the job: physical work, being present, being accountable, unseen context, or the cost of checking the output. The rubric is here.
Read each in full
Exposure is not displacement. A higher score does not rank two jobs by how safe they are, and nothing here models adoption, employment or pay.