Preface
Unless you live under a rock somewhere on Mars, you will be familiar with the term recession. It hits hard, both salaried persons as well as businessmen. However, there are people who don’t worry at all about the recession. Those without any debt! If they lost their income, they won’t lose their homes. They won’t lose their cars. Many of them have enough cash to live on for quite a while. Okay, debt-free and worry-free living is a different topic; leave it apart. So if you don’t have those cash savings to anticipate doom days, is yours a recession-proof business? Is yours a recession-proof job? Did you try recession-proofing your job? Are you ready to switch jobs to survive the recession?
If you’re yet to choose a career, have you analyzed which are those recession-proof careers? Before that, by the way, what is the difference between a career and a job? A job is something that you do just for the sake of money. You don’t bother about improving your skills and pay. Whereas in a career, you build up your skills to move into a more prestigious and higher echelon with greater pay and employment opportunity. Find a more detailed illustration of the differences between a job and a career.
Out of the necessities for basic living viz., food, water, air, health, clothing and shelter, the last two can get wrecked with the recession. Let’s check about the jobs in other sectors. Here are the best recession-proof jobs and recession-proof businesses for you in a glance.
Food Manufacturing
Unlike many other industries, the food manufacturing industry is not highly sensitive to economic conditions. The demand for food is likely to remain relatively stable even during periods of recession. So any business or career in the food manufacturing industry can be considered safe. It is the essential commodity to sustain lives, come whatever global recession or economic crisis.
Health Care
No matter whether it rains or shines, recession or progression, inflation or deflation, people will get sick. The number of people in older age groups, with much greater than average healthcare needs, will grow faster than the total population. Thanks to population control measures. As a result, the demand for health care will increase. So the healthcare industry isn’t going to get a blow with any meltdown. While, on the other hand, it continues to add jobs. So any job or business in health care is a recession-proof job or recession-proof business.
Educational Services
Maybe the stigma in the society that teachers are the laziest and don’t make a heavy bunch of money is true but they do earn a respectable living. They do have a lot of declared holidays and less working time. Recession isn’t going to reverse people from education. If you have a master’s degree or a doctorate in any discipline, you can get settled down with a well-paid teaching job. Why not settle for a teaching job or start a coaching center?
Legal Services
With increasing legal transactions, criminal cases, and civil disputes, and increasing demand for legal services in areas such as health care, intellectual property, venture capital, energy, elder, antitrust and environmental law, or to say it easily, as long as opinions defer, opportunities exist for legal professionals, come whatever economic crisis. So why not chose a legal career?
Public Services

Though there may not be a number of leaps of increments at regular intervals in salaries for the turners of the government machinery as with private jobs, permanent government jobs are the topmost safe ones as any government can’t run without its employees, be it the armed force or civilian force, and no government is going to cut jobs or reduce pay just because it is recession. Life after retirement too is safe for government employees with safe-on-earth pension plans where you can earn up to 80% of your highest salary with excellent health benefits. So why not make a career in public service as your first choice? A government contractor has the least affected, recession-proof business.
Energy
The combination of spiraling oil prices and recession could lead to consumers cutting back on energy, but they’re not going to stop using energy. As a matter of fact, this sector may grow as we need to find alternative sources of energy and renewable energy, as we are on the verge of running out of fossil fuels.
Skilled Services
The recession won’t stop your hair from growing. You can cut down the frequency of visiting a hairstylist. However, neither can you cut your hair on your own nor any of your family members could do that for you. Skilled service personnel like hairstylists, beauticians, or any skilled job are least affected. So a salon owner or a hairstylist has a recession-proof business or recession-proof job.
Transportation
Apart from air transportation, during economic slowdowns, full-time drivers, mechanics, and repairers of passenger vehicles are seldom laid off, be it rail, road or water transport. People move from one place to another as a part of their daily activities. They aren’t going to slow down except for some seasonal variations. Hence any job or a business in the passenger transportation sector isn’t going to get affected and thus a recession-proof job or a recession-proof business.
Repairs and Maintenance
Regardless of economic conditions, home appliances, heating, air-conditioning, and refrigeration mechanics/repairers aren’t going to get affected. Anybody hit by the recession would need them functioning smoothly at any cost. Similarly, no worries for even those $100,000 plumbers. Water pipes and sewages are ought to get clogged irrespective of the economic conditions. The same is the case for electricians. Though these folks may have less work in construction activities.
Beneficiaries of the Recession
Now, who will benefit best from the recession? With the enormous rate of proliferation of mobile phones in developing countries, access to the internet is becoming such an easy thing. The availability of basic cellphones has become dirt cheap that anybody could go mobile within two minutes. So any kid could forecast that internet commerce will flourish as people will seclude to their homes in front of TVs, computers, and cellphones minimizing outdoor entertainment, travel, and luxuries. So while surfing the net, they’re ought to search for bargains for anything they want to buy.
Similarly debt managers, debt collection agents, and debt management consultants! Recession means doom days for debtors. They’re sure to need some guidance. Recessions are tough times for companies as well. They’re likely to bring in consultants for advice on efficiency and to make the most out of their resources. As people default payments, companies will look to debt collectors to recover their costs. So anybody into these fields is going to make money while the recession shines!
Badly Hit Sectors
We have seen those recession-proof sectors. Now, what are those sectors that are usually affected by the recession? Retail trade, construction, consumer product manufacture, travel and hospitality, securities and investments, and banking. These are usually the hardest hit in a recession, as people spend less on luxuries and leisure. So won’t it be better to give the businesses or careers in these sectors the last preference?
Interesting idea…a recession proof job. I still see thousands of jobs posted on popular employment sites.
http://www.linkedin.com (networking)
http://www.indeed.com (aggregated listings)
http://www.realmatch.com (matches you to jobs)
good luck to those searching for jobs.
Teachers are the “laziest”??? Please, you wouldn’t last a day as a teacher!!!
@AG: It’s the “stigma” prevailing about teaching job in the society.
The media sector (television etc.) also ought to do well during the recession since the information needs of the people could increase during this entire period.
@Inder P Singh: Yes, as I mentioned, “people will seclude to their homes in front of TVs.”
Hi,
Interesting writeup!!
One interesting segment of “Recession-Proof Jobs” is that of firms engaged in economic research and analysis. Ironically, their work has increased post recession as individuals, famalies, institutions and corporations are looking up to them for information on how deep the recession is? and when will greener days come back?
These firms have tough times searching for answers to such questions.
Regards,
Nikhil Varghese, CMIE
(New-Delhi)
nice post this will give ideas for those newly graduate students searching for a new job to what field they must apply. I also think that the first three sector will not be greatly affected by recession.
People will get sick and hungry whether it is recession or not. So the first two sectors are fail proof!
energy source like oil drilling company here in Qatar is not stable. They laid off thousands of employee.
Yes, the lack of demand for crude, falling oil prices, and scores of foreign employees working in the middle east not only in the oil fields but also other sectors (drivers, carpenters, plumbers, masons, electricians and other blue collar jobs) returning to their hometowns indicates the recession is worse this time with its roots penetrating deep into the economy and has not the spared energy sector and the petroleum countries too! Some of my friends working in oil fields (drilling, refining etc.) in Kuwait and Saudi Arabia have returned home and they predict the situation to become more worse in the coming months.