Are these salary figures the same everywhere in the country?

No. They are national medians. Metro areas and certain states pay noticeably more or less for the same job, so check state level wage data for your own region before treating a national figure as a personal expectation.

Why do editors show almost no growth but nearly ten thousand openings a year?

Because most of those openings come from replacing people who leave the field, not from new positions being created. A field can be flat in total size while still hiring steadily every year.

Does a high median salary mean a career is a good fit for an INFJ?

Not by itself. Registered nursing pays the most on this list, but the fit note next to it, emotional attentiveness with steady follow through, matters just as much as the number when deciding whether the actual daily work will feel sustainable.

INFJ Advocate Career Paths & Best Jobs

INFJs do their best work when they can see who it helps, think deeply without constant interruption and avoid living in chronic conflict. The job title matters less than whether the daily work meets those needs. A therapist in an overloaded clinic can be more drained than an INFJ bookkeeper at a small charity they believe in.

The roles below draw on the INFJ strengths of reading people, long-range thinking and steady values. Use them as starting points, not a shortlist.

What INFJs need from work

A purpose they can name. "Students in this program graduate" motivates an INFJ far more than "hit the quarterly number." Without a purpose, they tend to disengage even when the job is easy.
Depth over volume. A few complex problems or long-term relationships suit them better than many short transactions.
Control over the method. They work best with a clear goal and room to decide how to reach it.
Ethical fit. Being asked to mislead customers or cut corners on care wears them down fast.
Quiet time. Regular blocks for focused thinking, away from open-plan noise and constant notifications.

Careers that often fit INFJs

Role	Why it fits
Psychologist or therapist	Long-term work with one person at a time, using pattern-reading to see what keeps someone stuck.
School counselor	Helps students plan and recover from setbacks, mixing one-on-one sessions with program design.
Writer or author	Turns inner depth into finished work, with long stretches of solitary focus.
Editor or content strategist	Shapes other people's ideas into something clear, rewarding high standards and a feel for the reader.
High school or university teacher	Subject depth plus mentoring relationships that last a year or more.
UX researcher	Interviews users and spots the unspoken frustration behind their answers.
Qualitative researcher	Finds themes across interviews and fieldwork, with freedom to choose methods.
Learning and development manager	The developmental side of HR: coaching programs, onboarding and training design rather than compliance paperwork.
Nonprofit program director	Links a mission to the daily work and to the people doing it.
Mediator	Holds several perspectives at once inside a structured process with clear rules.
Hospice or palliative care nurse	Patient-facing care where listening and calm matter as much as clinical skill.
Occupational therapist	Helps people rebuild daily life after illness or injury, with progress visible over weeks.
Social or health policy analyst	Works on systems that affect many people, at some distance from acute crisis work.

INFJs also build good careers in engineering, law, finance and medicine, especially in roles where they can see the human side of the work. The best careers for every MBTI type puts INFJ next to the other 15 types.

Workplaces that drain INFJs

Interrupt-driven offices. Constant pings, open-plan noise and back-to-back meetings leave no room for the slow thinking INFJs rely on.
High-volume, scripted contact. A call center with call-time targets asks for many short, surface-level exchanges, the opposite of how INFJs connect.
Image and politics cultures. Where being seen matters more than doing good work, INFJs either withdraw or spend their energy decoding subtext.
Adversarial roles where winning beats fairness. Some sales, collections and litigation jobs ask INFJs to push against people rather than work for them.
Unresolved team conflict. Even an ideal role sours when two colleagues have feuded for a year and the manager won't step in.

Day-to-day habits, teamwork and leadership are covered separately in INFJ work style.

Questions to ask before accepting a role

A job description rarely shows the things that decide whether an INFJ thrives. These questions, asked in an interview or of someone already on the team, get closer:

"Who benefits when this role is done well?" A vague answer is a warning sign for an INFJ who needs a purpose they can name.
"What does a typical week of meetings look like?" It tells you how much focused time you'll actually get.
"How does the team handle disagreements?" Listen for whether conflict gets resolved or just avoided.
"How is success measured here?" Pure volume metrics, like calls per hour, tend to wear INFJs down.
"Why did the last person leave?" Turnover stories often reveal the culture faster than any values statement.

Changing careers as an INFJ

INFJs often change direction when a job's purpose fades, not when the work gets hard. A few steps make the switch go better:

Name what is missing. Is it the work itself, the people, the organization or the pace? Sometimes a new employer fixes the problem without a new field.
Test before you leap. Volunteer, take a short course or shadow someone for a day. INFJs can idealize a field from the outside, and therapists and teachers do paperwork too.
Map your transferable skills. Listening, writing, synthesizing and running one-on-ones carry into coaching, research, HR development and design.
Plan the money. Retraining takes time, and financial strain makes even meaningful work hard to enjoy. Work out what the transition will cost before you commit.
Consider building something. Some INFJs find their fit by starting a practice or small business around a cause. MBTI and entrepreneurship looks at what that takes.

Using type in career decisions

Your type should inform career choices, not dictate them. Skills, values, finances and interests matter more than four letters, and plenty of INFJs thrive in fields no list would suggest.

Type is also not a hiring tool. The Myers-Briggs Company itself says it does not condone the use of the MBTI for any sort of hiring or selection. If personality comes up in a job interview, talking about MBTI in a job interview offers a sensible way to handle it.