I was born in a crabbing town in Alaska and grew up in Anchorage. I knew a lot of guys who were commercial fishermen. There are a lot of different forms of fishing and all of it is pretty darn dangerous. It seemed that every fisherman that I knew or met had scars or missing digits from their work. They made a hell of a lot of money, but there were no guarantees. Sometimes they made next to nothing.
Some of the biggest money is in fish spotting though. When a very short season opens, time is everything and boats hire fish spotters in planes to go looking for their fish. The spotters typically get a portion of the boat’s earnings (like maybe 10%) and can have contracts with several boats. Most of us could fly over a million dollars worth of fish and not have a clue what we are looking at; it’s a very specialized skill. Good spotters are rare and can earn $100,000 on the first day of a season.
