The average age of workers in various professions

If someone suffers a serious on-the-job injury, their age at the time that they get hurt can have a big impact on their future. For instance, younger workers — teens and those in their 20s — may avoid injuries more often or heal more quickly than older workers. Those who are nearing retirement age, on the other hand, may have to deal with some of the frailty of aging, which could make them more likely to get hurt or could make it more difficult for them to ever heal completely.

Age also matters for those who suffer such serious injuries that they become disabled. Say that you break your back in a fall and you can never work again. You have to use a wheelchair for the rest of your life. As you seek compensation for your lost future earnings, that financial picture is much different if you got hurt at 60 years old, just a few years from retirement, than if you got injured at 22 years old, in your first job since graduating from college.

With all of this in mind, here are the median ages for workers in a few different professions in the United States:

• Health care practitioners: 42.4 years old
• Athletes and coaches: 31.6 years old
• CEOS: 51.5 years old
• Logging workers 45.5 years old
• Construction laborers: 39.6 years old
• Electricians: 41.6 years old
• Registered nurses: 43.2 years old
• Stonemasons: 45.3 years old
• Carpenters: 41.9 years old
• Roofers: 37 years old
• Aircraft mechanics and service technicians: 44.3 years old
• Bus drivers: 53.2 years old
• Truck drivers: 46.3 years old

Naturally, this list just touches on the full scope of potential employment in Colorado. These are a handful of jobs out of thousands, and some of them pertain more to categories than to individual positions.

That said, we have focused on professions with a higher rate of serious injuries. Some studies have listed logging as the most dangerous profession in the United States, for instance. Roofers and construction workers have greater fall risks than other workers since they spend so much time working at heights. Electricians have a clear risk due to the sheer dangers of electricity and the amount of exposure they get. Anyone who drives for a living has a serious chance of getting injured in an accident simply because car crashes are one of the most common ways all Americans get hurt every year.

If you do get injured on the job, you need to know what role your age may play in the equation, what rights you have to seek compensation for everything you have lost and what legal steps you can take moving forward.