Incompetent Apprentice. Salary: $0 

You're in an apprenticeship program and people keep comparing you to the Sorcerer's Apprentice—you know, like when that mouse almost killed people with brooms?  

You spent two weeks on the virtual welder and managed to weld two girders...and also melt three. Better keep practicing.

Assembly-line Welder. Salary: $25,000

You're fresh out of vo-tech and earning fourteen dollars an hour. You work on an assembly line, where you weld car doors...and that's it. That's the only thing you know how to do. You have passable competence but your life's pretty monotonous. At least you've got that spacious studio apartment to return to.

Career Welder. Salary: $35,000

If there's an indoor welding job, you can probably do it. You know your TIG welding, your GMAW, your SMAW…all the acronyms. But you don't like to go outdoors and you don't like to go high up. Co-workers have started calling you "Lord Fancypants" because you're the famed master of the easy welds.

Offshore Welder. Salary: $70,000

You weld off-shore, in tough currents. You work long, long hours. You dive deep and you know your stuff. You do miss having a home life, though, and you're contemplating throwing in the towel before the depressurization sickness sets in. Decisions, decisions...

Deep-Sea Welder. Salary: $300,000

You are the Jacques Cousteau of underwater welding. There's no depth you will not dive, no beam you will not weld. Sharks run in fear when they see your torch a blazin'. When you come up from your latest offshore operation in the Arctic, you'll fly home to your beach house in Boca.