9 of 15
Public relations coordinator
- Median pay: $39,600
- % who say their job is stressful: 93.6%
"I got out of the TV biz because I wanted a more stable career with less stress, less pressure, less immediate deadlines," said Andrea Hurst, an account supervisor with public relations firm Crosby-Volmer International Communications. "Now there are days that make my old reporting job seem like a cakewalk."
Hurst checks her email as soon as she wakes up in the morning and right before she goes to bed.
Her job is to get the word out about her clients, but often her pitches fall upon deaf ears. The journalism field has been shrinking and there are more PR people vying for the attentions of fewer media outlets.
"I deal with rejection on weekly or daily basis," she said.
Methodology: Starting from a database of more than 9,000 jobs, PayScale used data from over 120,000 respondents who rated their jobs for quality of life factors. The top 15 were selected based on the national median pay for workers with at least five or seven years' experience and the percent of workers surveyed who said their jobs were "fairly stressful" or "extremely stressful." They were then ranked in order of pay, lowest to highest. Only jobs with median pay less than $50,000 were eligible., and only one job per "job family" was included. PayScale conducted the survey between August 2010 and August 2012.
- Last updated March 07 2013 08:59 AM ET
