CareerCast.com's annual rankings of the top 200 careers for 2015 reveal mathematics is key for career success.
According to the US-based Internet career resource, the majority of the top 10 jobs for this year - based on criteria including salary, job satisfaction, and safety - are steeped in mathematics, an area in which SA has been criticised as lacking.
"If you love crunching numbers and managing spreadsheets, you're in luck," says CareerCast, "Jobs in mathematics rank among the nation's [US's] best for 2015. These positions are financially lucrative, offer abundant opportunities for advancement and, most surprisingly, often deviate from common perceptions about math."
Second in line for top jobs of the year is the healthcare sector.
These are the 10 most desirable and lucrative professions to get into right now, according to the career site's research:
1. Actuary. This profession entails evaluating the likelihood of future events, using numbers.
2. Audiologist. This involves the diagnosis and treatment of hearing problems.
3. Mathematician. These experts apply mathematical theories and formulas to teach or solve problems in a business, educational, or industrial climate.
4. Statistician. A statistician tabulates, analyses and interprets the numeric results of experiments and surveys.
5. Biomedical engineer. This involves applying analysis and design solutions to problems in biology and medicine, with the goal of improving the quality and effectiveness of patient care.
6. Data scientist. This is a top job largely thanks to big data. It involves combining IT, statistical analysis and other disciplines to interpret trends from data.
7. Dental hygienist. This profession involves cleaning teeth, examining patients for oral diseases and provides other preventative dental care.
8. Software engineer. A software engineer researches, designs, develops and maintains software systems along with hardware development for medical, scientific, and industrial purposes.
9. Occupational therapist. These experts develop individualised programmes of activity for mentally, physically, developmentally and emotionally impaired persons, to aid them in achieving self-reliance.
10. Computer systems analyst. These IT analysts develop computer systems for businesses and scientific institutions.
CareerCast says the fact that the best jobs of 2015 are in either healthcare or IT should come as no surprise to anyone following employment trends in recent years. "Those two sectors have been the most promising."
According to the Jobs Rated report, software engineer and computer systems analyst are the best bets in IT.
The worst 10 jobs out of a list of 200, according to CareerCast, include newspaper journalist at number 200, broadcaster (196) and postman (191).
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