A Hard Day's Work

"The wizarding world is vast. Extensive. Of course, it used to be at a point where wizards were almost extinct. But thanks to the rising events of Muggleborns and heterozygous wizards (i.e. Half-Bloods), the wizards and witches are expanding again. To satisfy the financial status for this growing population, employment must be established. Of course, wizards can find employment in the Muggle world with knowledge of muggle customs and a wit for making good excuses. However, this outlook is limited to those who lack the power to remain in a magically active society (mainly Squibs). Fortunately, in the mainstream magical world, employment is far from restricted. The wizarding world has jobs that no muggle will ever know about, from dragon dung pickers, who attend to the personal needs of draconian colonies, to Obliviators, who ensure that no muggle will ever know about these jobs and other aspects of the wizarding world (e.g. the fact that it exists).

"One of the fastest growing and most enterprising wizarding areas in the world is that of Great Britain. When students leave Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, which is one of the top rated wizarding institutions in the world, they are presented with clear ideas of which professions to pursue. They then often undergo training for their desired jobs. The time span is which training takes place varies from occupation to occupation. Some, such as those of minor positions within the Ministry of Magic, may only require a few weeks of job orientation while others, such as Auror positions, expect several years of training and tests to ensure that all possible candidates possess the desired qualities. And for the daring witch or wizard, there is always the possibility of becoming an entrepreneur, an option without which many wizarding businesses could not have been created. However, new businesses require large expenditures to jumpstart themselves and many do not consider this idea without a proper source of capital. For those with a long-standing history of magical blood within the family, entering the family-run business is always promising. For this reason, many business owners hold younger family members as apprentices to launch the young ones into a related (no pun intended) career prescribed by the family. This is often thought to preserve the perfection that the business retains for creating a particular product.

"When being considered for a job, qualifications often speak more than the interviewee can (especially if said interviewee was particularly nervous). In the past, due to the fact that many businesses and employers favored older, more experienced applicants to newly-graduated ones, there was a large amount of unemployment within the young adult faction of the society. However, in order to rectify that, the Ministry of Magic had founded the Wizarding Examinations Authority (WEA). This institution's goal is to test Hogwarts students of their aptitudes at standards subjects at both the basic and advanced levels in order give employers good analyses of their younger interviewee's skills. Because of this, although experience is still a factor in employment, especially for that of higher posts, the younger workers can easily obtain jobs and show employers that they are qualified for their positions. The WEA has established two standardized tests for the students of Hogwarts; the Ordinary Wizarding Levels (O.W.L.'s), which tests basic aptitude at subjects and is instrumental in placing fifth-year students into appropriate classes for their sixth year, and the Nastily Exhausting Wizarding Tests (N.E.W.T.'s), which tests students for advanced magic in certain subjects. Through their excellent testing method, the WEA has managed to identify students with fine magical skills and aid these students in reaching the vocation of their choices.

"The average salary of the wizarding society located within the British Isles is about 12,444 Galleons, 4 Sickles and 21 Knuts (not including the funds resulting from illegal activities of course). This is of course due to the fact that menial jobs and tiresome day-to-day jobs at Gringotts are conferred to house elves and goblins respectively, allowing witches and wizards to receive (in theory) more interesting and high-paying jobs. This is not meant to infer that wizarding jobs have not evolved themselves to become dreary like many of their Muggle counterparts...."

- an excerpt from So You Want to Work in the Wizarding World by Sylvia Laybore