AI exposure: Judges, Magistrate Judges, and Magistrates
Arbitrate, advise, adjudicate, or administer justice in a court of law. May sentence defendant in criminal cases according to government statutes or sentencing guidelines. May determine liability of defendant in civil cases. May perform wedding ceremonies.
Reading this score
computedAt 8.2% of weighted task load, Judges, Magistrate Judges, and Magistrates sits at the 11th percentile, below the point where a job's centre of gravity has moved. 81.1% of what this role does is untouched, meaning current systems cannot produce that work at all, whatever the commercial incentive.
What holds the line here is accountability. Across this occupation's 21 tasks it averages 2.90 out of 3, the highest of the five friction dimensions. In plain terms, someone licensed has to sign the work. Capability and permission are different things. Where a statute or a professional body requires a named, liable human to approve the output, the work can be drafted by a machine and still require the person.
The most exposed thing this job does is Provide information regarding the judicial system or other legal issues through the media and..., at 66.7%. The least is Perform wedding ceremonies, at 0.0%. A gap of 66.7% between two parts of the same job is the reason this index publishes at task level. An occupation-wide number would have hidden both.
Within legal occupations, this one is less exposed than the median of 27.8% across the group's 7 roles, with 6 scoring higher. Being in an exposed family does not make a particular job exposed, and the reverse holds too.
What would move this score. Of 21 tasks, 1 are currently banded exposed, 3 assisted and 17 untouched. For that distribution to shift materially would take a change in who is permitted to sign the work, which is a question for regulators rather than for engineers. The score is re-computed every quarter against a fresh capability reference, and the change is published rather than quietly applied.
Where the score comes from
judgedEvery task is scored through the standardised work activities it maps to. These are this occupation’s averages on the six rubric dimensions. Capability is what AI can do; the other five are what stands in the way.
| Dimension | Mean | Scale |
|---|---|---|
| Capability | 0.76 | 0-4 |
| Embodiment | 1.12 | 0-3 |
| Presence | 2.40 | 0-3 |
| Accountability | 2.90 | 0-3 |
| Context | 2.33 | 0-3 |
| Verification cost | 2.76 | 0-3 |
Task by task
21 tasks, O*NET 31.0| Task | Exposed | Assisted | Untouched | Importance | Band |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Provide information regarding the judicial system or other legal issues through the media and public speeches. | 66.7% | 33.3% | 0.0% | 2.94 | exposed |
| Read documents on pleadings and motions to ascertain facts and issues. | 35.0% | 40.0% | 25.0% | 4.60 | assisted |
| Research legal issues and write opinions on the issues. | 27.1% | 35.4% | 37.5% | 4.52 | assisted |
| Write decisions on cases. | 20.0% | 30.0% | 50.0% | 4.61 | assisted |
| Award compensation for damages to litigants in civil cases in relation to findings by juries or by the court. | 8.3% | 16.7% | 75.0% | 4.56 | untouched |
| Supervise other judges, court officers, and the court's administrative staff. | 8.3% | 16.7% | 75.0% | 3.73 | untouched |
| Settle disputes between opposing attorneys. | 3.3% | 21.7% | 75.0% | 4.16 | untouched |
| Participate in judicial tribunals to help resolve disputes. | 3.3% | 21.7% | 75.0% | 4.34 | untouched |
| Grant divorces and divide assets between spouses. | 2.9% | 9.6% | 87.5% | 4.44 | untouched |
| Sentence defendants in criminal cases, on conviction by jury, according to applicable government statutes. | 0.0% | 0.0% | 100.0% | 4.78 | untouched |
| Monitor proceedings to ensure that all applicable rules and procedures are followed. | 0.0% | 0.0% | 100.0% | 4.71 | untouched |
| Instruct juries on applicable laws, direct juries to deduce the facts from the evidence presented, and hear their verdicts. | 0.0% | 0.0% | 100.0% | 4.65 | untouched |
| Rule on admissibility of evidence and methods of conducting testimony. | 0.0% | 0.0% | 100.0% | 4.59 | untouched |
| Preside over hearings and listen to allegations made by plaintiffs to determine whether the evidence supports the charges. | 0.0% | 0.0% | 100.0% | 4.59 | untouched |
| Advise attorneys, juries, litigants, and court personnel regarding conduct, issues, and proceedings. | 0.0% | 0.0% | 100.0% | 4.55 | untouched |
| Interpret and enforce rules of procedure or establish new rules in situations where there are no procedures already established by law. | 0.0% | 0.0% | 100.0% | 4.41 | untouched |
| Issue arrest warrants. | 0.0% | 0.0% | 100.0% | 4.32 | untouched |
| Impose restrictions upon parties in civil cases until trials can be held. | 0.0% | 0.0% | 100.0% | 3.82 | untouched |
| Rule on custody and access disputes, and enforce court orders regarding custody and support of children. | 0.0% | 0.0% | 100.0% | 4.74 | untouched |
| Conduct preliminary hearings to decide issues, such as whether there is reasonable and probable cause to hold defendants in felony cases. | 0.0% | 0.0% | 100.0% | 4.56 | untouched |
| Perform wedding ceremonies. | 0.0% | 0.0% | 100.0% | 2.39 | untouched |
Task text and importance ratings sourced from O*NET 31.0. Shares computed. The occupation score is the importance-weighted mean.
Occupations either side of this one
The four closest scores in the same occupational family, then the four closest anywhere in the index.
Read this carefully. Exposure is not displacement. A high score means current AI systems can produce this work, not that anyone will stop paying a person to do it. Adoption depends on economics, regulation and inertia that this index deliberately does not model. How the score is built.
What this means in practice
Most of this work is not reachable by current systems, so the immediate pressure is on the administrative edges of the role rather than its core: the scheduling, the reporting, the written records. That is where time is recovered.