FlightWay / Careers / Tax Preparers
Business & Finance
Tax Preparers
Prepare tax returns for individuals or small businesses.
- Sector: Business & Finance
- Preparation: Zone 3 — medium preparation needed
- O*NET code: 13-2082.00
What you'll actually do
The activities O*NET rates highest for this occupation, most important first. Numbers are out of 100.
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Working with Computers
central to the job — rated 92/100 for importance.
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Getting Information
central to the job — rated 89/100 for importance.
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Updating and Using Relevant Knowledge
central to the job — rated 87/100 for importance.
-
Processing Information
a major part of the work — rated 81/100 for importance.
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Documenting/Recording Information
a major part of the work — rated 81/100 for importance.
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Evaluating Information to Determine Compliance with Standards
a major part of the work — rated 74/100 for importance.
Prepare tax returns for individuals or small businesses.
What it takes
Two numbers per line: the level the work expects, and how important it is to doing the job well. Both are O*NET ratings, already on a 0–100 scale.
Skills
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Reading Comprehension
Needed at a solid working level (57/100), and rated 75/100 for importance.
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Active Listening
Needed at a solid working level (57/100), and rated 72/100 for importance.
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Critical Thinking
Needed at a solid working level (52/100), and rated 63/100 for importance.
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Speaking
Needed at a solid working level (50/100), and rated 53/100 for importance.
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Active Learning
Needed at a basic working level (43/100), and rated 53/100 for importance.
Knowledge
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Economics and Accounting
Needed at a high level (63/100), and rated 73/100 for importance.
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English Language
Needed at a high level (61/100), and rated 69/100 for importance.
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Customer and Personal Service
Needed at a high level (66/100), and rated 68/100 for importance.
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Mathematics
Needed at a high level (63/100), and rated 65/100 for importance.
Abilities
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Oral Comprehension
Needed at a solid working level (57/100), and rated 75/100 for importance.
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Oral Expression
Needed at a solid working level (57/100), and rated 72/100 for importance.
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Written Comprehension
Needed at a solid working level (57/100), and rated 72/100 for importance.
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Near Vision
Needed at a solid working level (55/100), and rated 72/100 for importance.
How people get in
O*NET places this occupation in Zone 3 — medium preparation needed. That is a statement about what employers typically require, not a rule about you.
Education
Vocational training, an associate degree, or equivalent on-the-job experience.
Experience
One to two years of related experience is typical.
Training
Employers expect you to arrive with the core skill already.
What it pays
These are typical finance compensation bands by employer tier — sector-level figures, not a measured salary for Tax Preparers specifically. Treat them as the shape of the market, then check a real posting for the number.
Goldman · JP Morgan · KKR
$150k – $400k+
Regional Banks & Funds
$85k – $130k
Credit Unions & Local Firms
$55k – $85k
How the work tends to run
Each line below is read off a single O*NET activity rating for this occupation — named, so you can disagree with it.
- Most of the day happens at a screen.From “Working with Computers”
- Rules and standards are checkable and someone checks them.From “Evaluating Information to Determine Compliance with Standards”
How FlightWay scores your fit against this
No black box. Here is the whole method, factor by factor.
- 1. You answer a short quiz
- Your answers build a profile across the same 161 O*NET dimensions this page is describing — skills, knowledge, abilities and work activities. Same axes, so the comparison is like-for-like.
- 2. We correlate the two profiles
- Fit is a mean-centered cosine — a correlation between the SHAPE of your profile and the shape of Tax Preparers. Centering matters: raw similarity between any two occupations sits at 0.70–0.85 because all work shares a common profile, so without it every career would look like a match.
- 3. The number you see is personality fit only
- "Would I want this work" and "am I ready for this work" are different questions, and averaging them answers neither. So readiness — what your résumé, coursework and projects prove — is scored separately and shown next to fit, never blended into it.
- 4. Every factor is visible
- You can open any match and see which dimensions pushed it up and which pulled it down. If you disagree with the number, you can see exactly where it came from.
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See your fit for Tax Preparers
Ten questions, about 90 seconds. You get your match against Tax Preparers and 782+ other real careers — with the reasoning shown.
Take the quiz Open in FlightWayOccupational data on this page comes from the O*NET 30.3 Database, published by the U.S. Department of Labor, Employment and Training Administration (USDOL/ETA). O*NET is a registered trademark of USDOL/ETA. FlightWay is not endorsed by, and USDOL/ETA is not responsible for, anything built on that data — see our terms. What is ours is the comparison, the score and the plan.