The World Cup is well underway in America, and players and fans alike can thank the logistics professionals working behind the scenes to make it happen.
Recent survey data found that logistics jobs—specifically transportation, storage, and distribution manager roles—rank first among the strong and promising careers essential to tournament operations, based on their annual salary, projected growth rate, and operational relevance.
The information comes from career and job search firm Zety, which released its World Cup Career Index report earlier this month. The company analyzed World Cup planning information and Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) data to identify the top 15 jobs most critical to tournament operations—jobs that also offer strong wages, long-term growth potential, and that typically don’t require a bachelor’s degree.
Transportation, storage, and distribution managers rank first overall with a World Cup Career Index Score of 84, reflecting high wages, above-average job growth, and overlap across all World Cup operational areas. The job category includes managers that plan, direct, or manage the movement of both people and goods.
To determine which industries are most closely tied to the event, Zety researchers analyzed publicly available World Cup planning materials and identified occupations aligned with at least one of five key operational areas: transportation and crowd logistics, venue operations, public safety, infrastructure, and tourism support.
Researchers then used salary and projected job growth data from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS), along with each occupation’s relevance across the five operational areas, to calculate a World Cup Career Index Score and determine final rankings.
By combining labor market trends with operational relevance, the analysis identifies jobs with no degree that are best positioned to benefit from both tournament-related demand and broader workforce growth, according to Zety.
Other key findings include:
- All top-ranked occupations report mean annual salaries of at least $60,000, with three exceeding $90,000.
- Occupational health and safety technicians and industrial machinery mechanics have the highest projected growth rates at 12% and 13%, respectively, compared to the national average of 3%.
- More than half of the top 15 occupations are tied to infrastructure, utilities, or facility maintenance, highlighting the workforce needed to support large-scale events.
