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New accounts clerks

Name: New Accounts Clerks: employment and wages since 1950
Creator: Future History
License: https://futurehistory.earth/terms

In brief

In May 2025, BLS counted 36,860 US new accounts clerks, with median pay of $47,670 a year. The earliest figure here is an estimate of 40,000 from 1950, not measured the same way as today's count. The last full technology era for new accounts clerks: Internet banking and online account opening, 1995 to 2015.

Official statistic: latest count and pay.Researched context: earliest figure.

What the sources say

Official outlook

BLS projects employment to decline 6.5% from 2025 to 2035.

BLS Employment Projections 2025-35

Official statistic

AI exposure studies

60% of this job's tasks are exposed to large language models. Not a forecast of job losses. Eloundou and others, 2023 Official statistic
0.99 estimated probability that the whole occupation could be computerised, over an unspecified number of years. Not a forecast of job losses. Frey and Osborne, 2013 Official statistic

Since the 2013 prediction

In 2013, Frey and Osborne put this job's probability of computerisation at 0.99. BLS counted 56,990 of these jobs in May 2013 and 36,860 in May 2025 (-35%, a change derived by Future History).

Official statistic

Data as of BLS OEWS May 2025; BLS Employment Projections 2025-35. BLS publishes these counts as yearly survey snapshots and cautions against reading them as a precise trend. In May 2021 BLS changed how it estimates these counts (a model-based method using three years of survey data) and moved fully to the 2018 occupation codes, so part of a change across 2021 can come from the method rather than the work.

Last updated 11 October 2026.

Cite this page

APA

Future History. (2026, October 11). New accounts clerks: jobs and pay since 1950 [Data set; data as of BLS OEWS May 2025; BLS Employment Projections 2025-35]. https://futurehistory.earth/timeline/43-4141

Chicago

Future History. "New accounts clerks: jobs and pay since 1950." Data as of BLS OEWS May 2025; BLS Employment Projections 2025-35. Last modified October 11, 2026. https://futurehistory.earth/timeline/43-4141.

BibTeX

@misc{futurehistory_43_4141, author = {{Future History}}, title = {New accounts clerks: jobs and pay since 1950}, year = {2026}, month = oct, howpublished = {\url{https://futurehistory.earth/timeline/43-4141}}, note = {Last updated 2026-10-11. Data as of BLS OEWS May 2025; BLS Employment Projections 2025-35}, }

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1850187519001925195019752000now

2026

Known then as Bank Clerk / Savings Bank Clerk (pre-Federal Reserve general banking era)

Known then as Bank Clerk / New Accounts Officer / Savings Deposit Clerk (regulated commercial banking era)

Known then as New Accounts Representative / Accounts Opening Clerk (consumer banking growth era)

Known then as New Accounts Specialist / Personal Banker / Sales Associate (deregulation and branch-expansion era)

Known then as New Accounts Clerks (BLS SOC 43-4141)

Known today as New Accounts Clerks (BLS SOC 43-4141)

Projected to still be called New Accounts Clerks (BLS SOC 43-4141)

Data from the May 2025 survey

US Employment

37K

Est.

Stated in source: BLS OEWS

Official statistic

Report an error

Median Annual Wage

$47,670

Est.

≈ $46,448 in 2024 prices (derived by us, CPI-adjusted)

Official statistic

Report an error

Beat · 1819

The Provident Institution for Savings in the Town of Boston, chartered in 1816, and the Bank for Savings in the City of New York, chartered in 1819, are among the first mutual savings banks in the United States established specifically to encourage working-class thrift. Each maintained a clerk whose responsibility was to open and record new savings accounts for depositors who might bring in as little as one dollar. These early new accounts clerks were almost exclusively men, typically young men with good handwriting, numeracy, and a respectable family background -- banking was a genteel occupation in the Jacksonian era.

Beat · 1913

The Federal Reserve Act of December 23, 1913 created the Federal Reserve System and established uniform standards for member bank operations including account-keeping requirements. Banks that joined the Federal Reserve were required to maintain specified reserve ratios and adopt standardized account classification and reporting, which drove adoption of mechanized bookkeeping equipment and standardized account-opening forms across member banks. The Fed's examination process incentivized banks to maintain clean, consistently formatted account records -- an administrative improvement that directly shaped how new accounts clerks worked.

Beat · 1933

The Banking Act of 1933 (Glass-Steagall Act) and the creation of the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC) transformed the new accounts function in a lasting way: federal deposit insurance made the question "is my money safe here?" unnecessary, removing one of the primary sources of customer anxiety that had previously required extensive reassurance from the new accounts clerk. By the late 1930s, FDIC insurance coverage had reached most US depositors; opening an insured account became a routine transaction rather than an act of financial courage. FDIC insurance also standardized the language the new accounts clerk was required to explain, since federally insured institutions had to disclose coverage limits at account opening.

Beat · 1959

Bank of America, working with Stanford Research Institute, completes the deployment of ERMA (Electronic Recording Method of Accounting) across its California branch network in 1959. ERMA processed account transactions using magnetic ink character recognition (MICR) on checks and created the first fully automated bank account management system at scale, covering approximately 2 million accounts. For new accounts clerks, ERMA introduced the modern paper account-opening form: the clerk gathered information face to face, filled out a standardized multipart form, and then submitted it to a processing center where the account was established in the computer system rather than by the clerk's own hand in a ledger.

Beat · 1969

On September 2, 1969, Chemical Bank installs the first automated teller machine in the United States at its branch in Rockville Centre, New York. The bank's promotional material proclaims: "On Sept. 2 our bank will open at 9:00 and never close again." The ATM begins offloading routine cash transactions from tellers, which paradoxically makes it economical to open more branches at lower per-transaction cost. Between 1970 and 2009, the number of US bank branches grows from approximately 35,000 to 99,500 -- and each new branch requires new accounts staff. The ATM does not displace the new accounts clerk; it funds the expansion of the platform that employs them.

Beat · 1980

The Depository Institutions Deregulation and Monetary Control Act of 1980 (DIDMCA) and the Garn-St. Germain Depository Institutions Act of 1982 together remove the interest rate ceilings (Regulation Q) that had governed bank deposit products since 1933, allowing banks to compete for deposits with market-rate products. The immediate effect is a proliferation of new deposit product types -- NOW accounts (checking accounts that pay interest), money market accounts, CDs with variable maturities and rates. Each new product requires the new accounts clerk to understand, explain, and match it to the customer's needs. The role transitions from a clerical intake function to a customer-facing sales and advisory role. Banks begin using the title "personal banker" to signal this upgraded expectation.

Beat · 1995

Wells Fargo becomes the first US bank to add account services to its website in 1995. That same year, Presidential Bank, a small Washington DC-area thrift, becomes the first institution to open accounts entirely online -- without any branch visit or human interaction. The combined significance of these events is not immediately apparent: online banking in 1995 is a novelty used by a tiny fraction of the public. But they mark the technical proof-of-concept for the most significant structural threat to the new accounts clerk role: the elimination of the branch visit as a prerequisite for opening a deposit account.

Beat · 2009

US bank branch count reaches its all-time peak of approximately 99,550 in 2009, according to FDIC data. New accounts clerk employment likely peaks in roughly the same period, reflecting the branch count maximum. From 2009 onward, branch closures accelerate as mobile banking penetration grows and banks consolidate footprint. By 2020 the branch count had fallen to approximately 77,000 -- a decline of more than 22,000 branches over eleven years. Each closed branch eliminated one or more new accounts positions; the occupation's employment decline tracks the branch closure curve closely.

How to read this number

OEWS is a point-in-time survey snapshot, not a continuous time series; BLS advises against using it for year-over-year trend comparison.

Each dot is a cited figure over time; the dotted line only links them (values between aren't measured). Hollow dots are estimates.

Official statistic: Copied by a script from a statistics agency table or a published study's table, not retyped by hand. BLS figures, ONS ASHE figures (UK pay and jobs) and the forecast and exposure tables are also re-checked against that table on every data run. Researched context: Researched from the cited source rather than copied from it by a script, so it is not machine-checked yet. Spot a mistake? Each figure has a “Report an error” link.

How it began · 1850

When the Dime Savings Bank of Brooklyn opened on June 15, 1859, it offered something new to the working poor of Kings County: the right to open a deposit account with as little as one dime. The teller at the window could take a cash deposit from a factory hand or a domestic servant, but someone else at a desk nearby had to do the paperwork of account creation: recording the customer's name, address, and occupation in the ledger, assigning an account number, issuing a passbook, and explaining the interest terms. That desk clerk was performing what we now call new accounts work. The role in this form was not new in 1859; savings banks and commercial banks in Boston, New York, and Philadelphia had employed dedicated account-opening clerks since at least the 1820s and 1830s, when mutual savings banks first proliferated as instruments of working-class thrift. What changed across the late nineteenth century was volume and formalization: as the United States industrialized and banking expanded west with the railroads, more banks opened more branches and more people who had never held a bank account began opening their first one. By 1900 the US had approximately 12,427 national and state commercial banks plus more than 1,000 savings institutions, each requiring at minimum one person whose job included onboarding new depositors. The role was gendered male until the 1870s, when women began entering banking in measurable numbers; the share of women among bank clerks exceeded 50% nationally by World War II, when men were drafted and banks needed to fill the seat. After deregulation in the late 1970s and early 1980s, the new accounts function transformed from a clerical duty into a sales role: the bank that retained a new depositor's lifetime relationship sold them a mortgage, a CD, a safe-deposit box, and eventually a mutual fund. The new accounts clerk became the front door of that relationship, and the job title expanded to reflect it: "personal banker," "new accounts representative," "financial services associate." The consumer internet then opened a second front door that did not require a human being to be on the other side, and the occupation has contracted ever since.

Cited forecasts · present → 2035

Will AI replace new accounts clerks? What the research says

Each figure is stated by the named source; we publish no forecasts of our own. Where sources disagree, we show the disagreement rather than an average.

Each figure is stated by the named source; we publish no forecasts of our own. Where sources disagree, the spread is the honest signal.

What published forecasts say

Forecast change in the number of people doing this work, as published by each named source. Bars share one scale on every role, centred on zero and reaching the end at ±30%. Grey marks a small change, 3% or less either way.

BLS Employment Projections 2025-35
Target year 2035
-6.5%
BLS National Employment Matrix, 2025-35 cycle, line for SOC 43-4141 (New accounts clerks): 37.9 thousand jobs in 2025, projected 35.5 thousand in 2035, a change of -2.5 thousand (-6.5%). Matrix employment counts all jobs in the occupation, including self-employed workers. The average for all occupations in this cycle is +3.5%.
Official statisticReport an error

How exposed is this work to AI (research measures)

Scores as published by each study. Each row says what it measures. These measure what AI could technically do, not forecasts of jobs lost.

Frey & Osborne (2013), "The Future of Employment"
2013 study · Probability of computerisation (2013 model)
0.99
probability
What this measures
Published appendix value for SOC 2010 43-4141 New Accounts Clerks: probability of computerisation 0.99, rank 693 of 702 (rank 1 is least computerisable). Frey and Osborne estimated in 2013, with a Gaussian-process classifier on O*NET variables, how likely the whole occupation is to be technically automatable over "some unspecified number of years, perhaps a decade or two". It is a probability for the occupation, not a share of tasks and not a forecast of jobs lost.
Official statisticReport an error
Eloundou et al. (2023), "GPTs are GPTs"
2023 study · Share of tasks exposed to LLMs (β, human-rated)
60%
of tasks
What this measures
Published occupation-level exposure from the paper's occ_level.csv for O*NET-SOC 43-4141.00 New Accounts Clerks. Shown: human-rated β = 0.6, the share of the occupation's tasks an LLM could do in at least half the time at equal quality, counting tasks that need LLM-powered software at half weight (β = E1 + 0.5 × E2). Other published measures for this occupation: human-rated α (LLM alone) 0.52 and γ (all LLM-assisted) 0.68; GPT-4-rated β 0.56. This measures how much of the work an LLM could touch, not how many jobs disappear.
Official statisticReport an error

Today, in this role

What's changing day to day for new accounts clerks

Three parts of your work where AI is already doing real lifting, and what stays yours.

AI is sitting alongside you here Perform teller duties as required

Sources^[2]

Where your edge is

AI is sitting alongside you here Compile information about new accounts…

, enter account information into computers, and file related forms or other documents.^[2]

Where your edge is

AI is sitting alongside you here Collect and record customer deposits and fees and issue…

receipts, using computers.^[2]

Where your edge is

Tools of the era

How has the work of new accounts clerks changed since 1850?

The tools that defined the work, one line per era. Select an era to see how it reshaped the work.

Ledger book and passbook (manuscript account-opening era)
Before any mechanization, opening a new bank account required the clerk to hand-write the customer's personal information into a bound ledger, assign an account number from a sequential register, issue a handwritten or printed passbook, and record the initial deposit. The passbook was the customer's only record of their balance; banks kept the authoritative ledger. The work was deliberate, error-prone, and labor-intensive: a single clerk could process perhaps fifteen to twenty new account openings per day given the time required to gather identity information, write clearly, and perform arithmetic for interest calculations. The skill set was penmanship, arithmetic, and a memory for bank policy -- not yet sales.
Burroughs and NCR bookkeeping machines (mechanized ledger era)
The Federal Reserve Act of 1913 standardized banking regulation and accelerated the adoption of mechanized bookkeeping. Burroughs Adding Machine Company and NCR (National Cash Register) both produced specialized banking machines in the 1910s and 1920s that could post transactions to ledger cards mechanically, calculate interest, and print customer statements. By the 1930s, the Burroughs Class 5 and similar machines were standard equipment at US commercial banks. For the new accounts function specifically, the shift from handwritten ledgers to typed ledger cards (later transferred to machine-posted ledger sheets) reduced transcription errors and allowed account records to be centralized in a filing system rather than a bound book. The new accounts clerk of this era needed to be proficient on the bookkeeping machine and on the Addressograph plate system (embossed metal plates used to address statements), skills that required weeks of training and were highly gender-stratified: women dominated the machine room, men dominated supervisory and lending roles.
Effect on the work
Mechanized bookkeeping modestly increased the throughput of individual account clerks, but because it also reduced error rates and allowed banks to maintain more accounts reliably, it primarily enabled banking expansion rather than reducing headcount. Employment in banking grew between 1910 and 1940 despite mechanization.
IBM mainframe and magnetic-stripe core banking systems (ERMA era)
Bank of America, working with Stanford Research Institute, deployed the Electronic Recording Method of Accounting (ERMA) in September 1955, processing checks using magnetic ink character recognition (MICR). The first fully automated bank account system went live in 1959. For the new accounts clerk, this era produced the account-opening form: instead of ledger cards, the clerk now filled out a multipart carbon paper form whose data was later keyed into the mainframe by a data-entry operator. The clerk's face-to-face role became a data-gathering exercise with a defined script. The customer ID, employment, references, and initial deposit were captured on a standardized form; the actual account creation happened overnight in the batch-processing cycle. Opening an account still required a branch visit and a human conversation, but the clerk was now a front-end for a machine rather than the complete record-keeping system.
Effect on the work
Mainframe core banking systems enabled banks to manage far more accounts per employee than was possible in the manual ledger era, which is a primary reason that teller employment doubled between 1970 and 2006 despite the ATM: branches remained cheaper to open and more accounts became manageable. The new accounts function benefited from this expansion.
ATM networks and real-time branch terminals (transaction-offload era)
On September 2, 1969, Chemical Bank installed the first ATM in the United States at its branch in Rockville Centre, New York. The bank advertised that it would "open at 9:00 and never close again." The ATM offloaded routine cash withdrawals and balance inquiries from tellers, which paradoxically allowed banks to operate more branches at lower cost -- the classic "ATM paradox" documented by economists James Bessen (2015) and others: more ATMs meant more branches, and more branches meant more bank staff overall, including new accounts clerks. By the late 1980s, real-time branch terminals (replacing the overnight batch model) gave new accounts clerks instant visibility into whether a new customer already held accounts at the bank, their credit status through real-time bureau queries, and a live confirmation that the new account had been created. The account-opening process shifted from "fill out this form and come back in three days for your checks" to "your account is open right now -- here is your temporary check."
Effect on the work
Each new branch required at least one new accounts specialist. The occupation's peak employment (about a hundred thousand estimated) coincided roughly with the peak branch count around 2008-2009.
Internet banking and online account opening (Wells Fargo 1995; Presidential Bank first online account 1995)
Wells Fargo became the first US bank to offer account services through a website in 1995. That same year, Presidential Bank became the first institution to open accounts entirely online. These two events mark the beginning of the end of the new accounts clerk as the exclusive gateway to becoming a bank customer. For most of the next decade, online account opening was a niche preference; most people still visited a branch. The 2004 adoption milestone -- 31% of US households banking online -- and the 2009 milestone -- 47% of American adults banking online (Pew Research) -- mark the phase transition during which online account opening shifted from option to default.
Effect on the work
Each closed branch eliminated at least one new accounts position. The employment impact was gradual rather than sudden, because many customers -- especially older customers and those in underserved communities -- continued to prefer branch-based account opening through the mid-2010s.
Mobile-first digital onboarding and AI-assisted KYC (current era)
The contemporary account-opening experience at most major US banks requires no human interaction: a customer opens a Chime, Marcus by Goldman Sachs, or Chase mobile account by photographing their driver's license, answering a few identity-verification questions, and making a small opening deposit via ACH or debit card transfer. Machine-learning Know-Your-Customer (KYC) systems from vendors such as Jumio, Socure, and Onfido perform identity document verification, OFAC screening, and fraud scoring in seconds. The new accounts clerk's core value -- explaining product differences, fielding questions, establishing trust with an anxious first-time depositor -- survives in the branch for complex accounts (small business, trust, estate), for customers with credit challenges, and for older demographics, but this is a smaller and declining portion of all new account openings. The surviving role concentrates increasingly on cross-selling, relationship management, and the human connection that a mobile app cannot provide for high-value customers.

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New Accounts Clerks employment and pay by year

On record since1850

Latest US employment36,860 (May 2025)Source: BLS OEWS May 2025Official statisticReport an error

Latest US median pay$47,670 (May 2025)Source: BLS OEWS May 2025Official statisticReport an error

Outlook-6.5% by 2035Source: BLS Employment Projections 2025-35Official statisticReport an error

View all 27 years of cited US data, each linked to its source

New Accounts Clerks in the US: employment and pay by year, with sources
Year	US employment	Annual pay (median unless marked)	Source	Report
1950	40,000	n/a	Est., US Census Bureau, 1950 Decennial Census [1] Researched context	Report
1960	n/a	$4,200 (average)	Est., University of Missouri Libraries [4] Researched context	Report
1970	65,000	n/a	Est., Wikipedia [2] Researched context	Report
1980	n/a	$10,400 (average)	Est., University of Missouri Libraries [5] Researched context	Report
2003	105,300	$25,930	BLS OEWS May 2003 [3] Official statistic	Report
2004	96,560	$26,860	BLS OEWS May 2004 [3] Official statistic	Report
2005	82,450	$27,420	BLS OEWS May 2005 [3] Official statistic	Report
2006	80,770	$28,390	BLS OEWS May 2006 [3] Official statistic	Report
2007	88,880	$29,610	BLS OEWS May 2007 [3] Official statistic	Report
2008	87,300	$30,230	BLS OEWS May 2008 [3] Official statistic	Report
2009	81,650	$30,640	BLS OEWS May 2009 [3] Official statistic	Report
2010	67,170	$30,440	BLS OEWS May 2010 [3] Official statistic	Report
2011	60,830	$31,030	BLS OEWS May 2011 [3] Official statistic	Report
2012	55,320	$31,720	BLS OEWS May 2012 [3] Official statistic	Report
2013	56,990	$33,190	BLS OEWS May 2013 [3] Official statistic	Report
2014	52,260	$34,000	BLS OEWS May 2014 [3] Official statistic	Report
2015	48,970	$34,880	BLS OEWS May 2015 [3] Official statistic	Report
2016	41,630	$34,990	BLS OEWS May 2016 [3] Official statistic	Report
2017	41,680	$35,260	BLS OEWS May 2017 [3] Official statistic	Report
2018	41,500	$35,800	BLS OEWS May 2018 [3] Official statistic	Report
2019	43,420	$36,550	BLS OEWS May 2019 [3] Official statistic	Report
2020	45,250	$37,750	BLS OEWS May 2020 [3] Official statistic	Report
2021	40,500	$37,840	BLS OEWS May 2021 [3] Official statistic	Report
2022	45,170	$40,820	BLS OEWS May 2022 [3] Official statistic	Report
2023	41,180	$44,630	BLS OEWS May 2023 [3] Official statistic	Report
2024	38,030	$46,610	BLS OEWS May 2024 [3] Official statistic	Report
2025	36,860	$47,670	BLS OEWS May 2025 [3] Official statistic	Report

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See all roles in Admin & Office

Ledger book and passbook (manuscript account-opening era) (1850 to 1913)

Burroughs and NCR bookkeeping machines (mechanized ledger era) (1913 to 1960)

IBM mainframe and magnetic-stripe core banking systems (ERMA era) (1960 to 1985)

ATM networks and real-time branch terminals (transaction-offload era) (1969 to 2000)

Internet banking and online account opening (Wells Fargo 1995; Presidential Bank first online account 1995) (1995 to 2015)

Mobile-first digital onboarding and AI-assisted KYC (current era) (2015 to present)

New Accounts Clerks employment and pay by year

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