Healthcare and aviation still sit at the top of U.S. pay tables. Airline and commercial pilots show a median of $226,600 in BLS figures. Many physician specialties sit at or above the BLS reporting cap, so the public median stops at $239,200 even when mean pay is higher.
Tech, finance, and a few trades can also clear six figures. Entry pay is usually lower. Seniority, licenses, and location move the number fast.
Are you chasing the headline salary, or a path you can actually finish from where you are now?
Thing is, the listing is only half the work. You still have to find openings, get past an ATS, and prove you meet the license or hour requirements. Job boards, resume tools, and salary filters help with that hunt. They do not replace the credential.
High-pay roles worth comparing first
Use this as a scan, not a ranking. Sources mix medians, all-in pay, and senior packages, so the axis is not identical across every row.
| Role | Pay cited | Typical entry bar | Source |
|---|---|---|---|
| Airline pilot | $226,600 median | CPL, then 1,000 hours and fleet training | BLS; Epic Flight Academy |
| Nurse practitioner | $114,981 median | BSN, RN, advanced practice | Forbes |
| Physician assistant | $115,573 median | Master's-level PA path | Same Forbes list |
| Actuary | About $120,000 median | Bachelor's plus exams | Rising Fellow |
| Investment banker | About $440,000 all-in ($200K base plus $240K bonus) | Finance degree, hub networking | Mergers & Inquisitions |
| Oil rig manager | $150K-$250K+ senior | HS plus training, offshore fitness | ALB Trial Lawyers |
| Software developer | $130,160 median | Bachelor's or a strong bootcamp portfolio | Zoe Talent Solutions |
| Cloud / database roles | $140K-$225K range | Degree path is the usual route to the top band | Alexander TG |
Regional pilots often start at $55K-$85K. Captains at major carriers can climb past $400K after upgrades, with long-haul rates cited around $475 an hour in industry reporting from Simple Flying. That spread is why a median can look nothing like year one.
Check the BLS highest paying occupations list before you treat any blog table as final. Medicine dominates the very top. BLS also hides a precise median once pay crosses its cap, which is why physician lines look truncated.
Healthcare jobs that keep showing up on six-figure lists
Nurse practitioners and physician assistants are the advanced-practice roles people actually switch into without medical school. Forbes puts NP pay at $114,981, with women holding about 87% of those jobs. PAs sit at $115,573, with women at about 64%.
Nurse anesthetists are a longer climb. You still need a BSN, an RN license, and about a year of ICU time before the graduate program, per Resume Genius. The hours are not light. One industry writeup found 28.5% of women doctors reporting overload versus 21.5% of men (Zoe Talent Solutions).
Older roundups that cluster seven healthcare jobs near $208,000 are using 2022 figures from PCE San Diego. Treat that cluster as history. Post-pandemic wages moved. Pull a current OEWS wage for the exact title in your state instead of recycling that average.
If you already work as an RN, the NP path is the common next step. It is still graduate school, clinical hours, and a board exam, not a weekend certificate.
Tech pay, remote listings, and the no-degree question
Software developers show a $130,160 median in that Zoe roundup, with growth estimates in the 16-25% range. Cloud and database work is cited at $140K-$225K. AI and ML engineering is cited at $160K-$252K by Alexander TG and a UC.edu IT careers note. Those tech ranges come from industry sites, not a single BLS table, so read them as bands.
A bachelor's is still the default filter on a lot of six-figure tech postings. Bootcamps can get you into development or IT support. They rarely, by themselves, put you in the $140K cloud band on day one.
Skip this lane if you hate debugging. Self-taught routes need real problem-solving, not just a course badge.
Can you reach top tech pay without a degree?
There is no clean BLS split for "no degree, $140K cloud architect." Boards will still show junior listings that skip the degree line. Senior cloud pay in the Alexander TG range is still easier to defend with a degree or a long, public work history.
Finance roles where the bonus dwarfs the base
Investment banking is the outlier on total cash. Mergers & Inquisitions describes roughly $200K base plus $240K bonus, or about $440K all-in, with a large share of that bonus deferred or paid in stock. About 55% of the package can come from fees. Thirty percent or more may not hit your account in the same year.
CFO and other finance-manager titles show up on high-pay lists from Forbes and Schiller. Portfolio managers and quants sit in the same conversation. The hours are long. Markets move the bonus.
A finance degree with economics or accounting depth is the usual ticket. Networking in New York, Chicago, or another hub still matters more than a cold apply from a generic resume.
Trades and oil work that skip the four-year degree
Oil-rig pay is a ladder, not one number. Mid-level drillers are cited at $70K-$100K. Senior managers are cited at $150K-$250K+. Offshore Houston packages of $100K-$200K show up in the same ALB writeup.
Union scale often beats non-union medians, according to ABC NorCal. You trade classroom years for physical risk, drug tests, and weeks away from home.
Picture a Houston offshore rotation: 12-14 hour shifts, then a block of days off. Fitness checks are not optional. If isolation or safety risk is a deal-breaker, this is the wrong list.
Airline pilots and other transport pay
The BLS median of $226,600 is the figure most roundups repeat. Epic Flight Academy talks about averages over $200,000. Major-carrier captains can clear $400K after those upgrades Simple Flying describes.
You need a commercial pilot license, roughly 1,000 hours, then type or fleet training. Regional pay can look ordinary until the upgrade. Some contracts advertise about two weeks off a month once you are on a major line. U.S. pay still beats the €50K-€80K European band those same comparisons use.
Air traffic control is a separate FAA-academy path. Do not mix it with the airline-pilot hour build.
High-pay jobs with strong representation of women, plus actuaries
Forbes and Resume Genius keep returning to the same cluster: nurse practitioner at about $115K (87% women), physician assistant at about $116K (64%), and HR manager at $92,335 with women in the majority. Leadership gaps still show up above those titles.
Actuaries land near $120,000 median, with entry closer to $70K-$80K while exams are in progress (Rising Fellow). The job is exam-heavy. It is also one of the few six-figure tracks that is more desk than shift work.
Turns out the "best jobs for women" lists and the raw BLS high-pay list are not the same document. One tracks representation. The other tracks dollars.
Degree paths versus faster training
| Path | Schooling | Example jobs | Upside | Tradeoff |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Degree | Bachelor's or higher | NP, software developer, actuary, banker | $100K+ medians and clearer growth | Four or more years, tuition |
| Faster training | HS plus certificates or hours | Oil-rig manager, union trades, some IT support | Quicker entry, senior oil pay cited at $150K+ | Physical risk, location-bound work |
Healthcare's very top dollars still sit behind advanced degrees. Tech is mixed. A two-year associate can be a faster clinical or technician on-ramp. It will not usually match NP or CRNA pay.
How to actually hunt these jobs on boards and apps
High-pay postings get flooded. Your search setup matters as much as the salary table.
- Pick one or two titles you can qualify for in 12-24 months, not a fantasy CEO listing. Confirm the wage on the BLS occupation finder for your state.
- Set job-board preferences for title, pay floor, schedule, commute, and remote versus on-site. Indeed's preference tools exist to keep those filters on.
- Search with a tight title query, then save an alert. Indeed's own search tips include
title:syntax and hiding listings you do not want, such as clearance-required roles you cannot hold (Indeed search help). - Rewrite the resume for the credential the posting names: RN plus ICU year, ATP hours, SOA/CAS exam progress, Series licenses, or a cloud cert stack. ATS software will not infer a license you left off.
- Use the board's salary view to sanity-check the posting against BLS, not against a Twitter screenshot.
To be honest, a lot of "remote six-figure" ads are bait. If the license, the hours, or the degree is missing from your profile, the board will still let you click Apply. The recruiter will not.
What state data and trend notes can (and cannot) tell you
This draft has no clean state-by-state wage table. BLS occupational wages by area are the right next click. Tech and healthcare growth into the early 2030s is widely projected in the mid-teens in the Forbes roundup of high-pay jobs. That is a projection, not a promise for your metro.
FAQ
Which U.S. jobs pay the most?
Physician specialties occupy the BLS cap. Outside medicine, airline pilots at a $226,600 median are the headline non-medical occupation in the BLS and Epic figures above. Investment banking all-in pay can print higher than either, but that is bonus math, not a BLS median.
Do you need a degree?
Not for every high-pay trade or oil role. Most of the $100K+ professional titles still filter for a bachelor's or a graduate license. ABC NorCal and ALB describe the no-degree ladder. Schiller-style finance lists do not.
What are the highest paying tech jobs people search for?
Cloud and database bands of $140K-$225K and AI/ML bands of $160K-$252K are the ranges Alexander TG cites. Software's $130K median is the broader occupation number from Zoe.
How much do pilots earn versus surgeons?
Pilots: $226,600 median, with captain packages cited above $400K after upgrades. Surgeons sit in the historical ~$208K healthcare cluster from 2022 PCE data and, in current BLS tables, often above the $239,200 reporting cap.
Which high-pay jobs have a large share of women?
Nurse practitioner, physician assistant, and HR manager, using the Forbes and Resume Genius figures already cited.
Open the BLS wage query for your state and one target title, then turn on a job alert for that exact title on the board you already use. If the license timeline is longer than two years, put the training cost next to the median before you quit the job you have.