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Work/where to live in Alaska

PostPosted: Wed Jun 11, 2014 10:36 am
by matthewtraver
Hey,

I'm considering the possibility of moving to Alaska after having lived in the UK for a good number of years (US citizen). These are probably dumb/basic questions, but any answers will help me! Where would you say is a good city/area to live in Alaska (near to mountains/climbing...)? Can anybody recommend any good seasonal work (anything; tourism/fishing/agriculture/retail)? What are some good job websites for Alaska? All the ones I seem to come up with are primarily government jobs. What's the job market like generally in the main areas? Is it relatively easy to turn up and find some form of work fairly quickly? Or not...?

Thanks in advance for any replies!

Matt

Re: Work/where to live in Alaska

PostPosted: Wed Jun 11, 2014 10:40 pm
by Tonka
What skills do you bring to the table? I spent 7 months working on a project all over Alaska and the common issues I saw were unless you brought a specific skill you were forced to work in the service industry. This is tough in AK because everything is so expensive. I loved Nome, Sitka and Juneau but Anchorage is you best bet unless you are independently wealthy. If you're a really odd guy you could try Fairbanks - fun but a strange town.

Re: Work/where to live in Alaska

PostPosted: Wed Jun 11, 2014 11:26 pm
by matthewtraver
Hey,

Thanks for the helpful reply. Hard skills I've got aside from the outdoor side of things is retail management, industrial sewing/product design and film-making/photography - a mish-mash... not sure if they're going to prove useful?! Although I'm normal, Fairbanks does sound intriguing...

Cheers,

Matt

Re: Work/where to live in Alaska

PostPosted: Thu Jun 12, 2014 2:55 pm
by Steve Gruhn
It's best to have a job lined up before you move to Alaska. Alaska can be an expensive place to live while searching for work. Much of the work in Alaska is seasonal. Rural areas have a significantly higher unemployment rate than urban areas, so you might focus on urban areas (Anchorage, Fairbanks, and Juneau are the only communities with more than 10,000 people). The good thing is that mountainous areas are readily accessible from all three urban areas. For Anchorage you might try anchoragehelpwanted.com. You might try the classified ads in the three large newspapers: the Anchorage Daily News, the Fairbanks Daily News-Miner, and the Juneau Empire.