Data Scientists Have Best Work-Life Balance: Study

(Bloomberg) -- The eight-hour day probably seems like a thing of the distant past—that is, unless you have one of the jobs below. 

According to a new survey from career website Glassdoor, while work-life balance has continued to decrease over the past six years, there are still areas where employees are happy with the amount of time they spend on the clock. 

Maintaining a healthy work-life balance can be tough in today’s work environment, but some jobs allow for more flexibility than others. In fact, work-life balance has decreased in recent years, as employees have reported an average work-life balance satisfaction rating of 3.5 in 2009, 3.4 in 2012, and 3.2 thus far in 2015. 

It's not just one industry getting the perk, either. Jobs on the top-25 list range from data scientist, to substitute teacher, to marketing manager. To find positions where work-life balance consistently comes up as a plus, Glassdoor looked at its company reviews. Users who review a company can also rate several workplace attributes of their job, including work-life balance, on a scale of 1-5. To make Glassdoor's list, a job title had to have been rated by at least 75 people with that position at two or more companies, and 15 percent of reviews for the job title had to cite work-life balance as a pro. 

While these roles all rank high for the amount of time you can spend at the office, some of them don't pay as well as others. Data scientists, who make nearly $115,000 annually, took the No. 1 spot in both work-life balance and salary. Meanwhile, lab assistants and substitute teachers were paid less than one- fourth of that: $27,550 and $24,380, respectively. 

Although Glassdoor didn't want to give us a list of jobs with the worst work-life balance, it did provide us with four roles that fall below the average work-life balance rating of 3.2. The ratings for these jobs ranged from 2.7 to 3.0, and they had salaries that were unlikely to make up for the poor hours. 

Perhaps you want to keep this in mind the next time you embark on a job search. 

  

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