Integrated Occupation and Industry Codes and Occupational Standing Variables in the IPUMS

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The Census Bureau has reorganized its occupational and industrial classification systems in almost every census administered since 1850. These changes often suit the needs of researchers studying a particular census year, but they present serious problems for researchers studying longer periods of time. The IPUMS retains all original occupation and industry information in the OCC and IND variables. Samples from 1850-1930 additionally contain respondents' original alphabetic responses to these questions in the OCCSTR and INDSTR variables. These variables contain hundreds of thousands of individual responses.

We have also created a variety of occupation and industry measures more suitable for long-term analysis.

OCC1950 codes occupations from all years into the 1950 occupational scheme. OCC1990 codes occupations from 1950 onward into a modified version of the 1990 occupational scheme. OCC1950 and OCC1990 allow researchers to use a consistent classification scheme to locate persons in the occupational/social structure. IND1950 and IND1990 accomplish the same for industrial classifications.

The section directly below describes the method used in recoding occupations, focusing particularly on OCC1950. The OCC1990, IND1950, and IND1990 variables were created using the same techniques as was OCC1950.

The OCC1950/OCC1990 variables each have hundreds of categories and thus are often unwieldy for studying structural societal changes. Even the most consistent occupational groupings are often too general and heterogeneous for some purposes, as well as unsuitable for many statistical techniques.

An alternative approach involves scaling occupations according to some external criterion in order to turn occupation into a measure of prestige or socioeconomic standing. Such measures are a staple of modern social scientific research. To accommodate researchers needing this type of measure, we have incorporated various measures of occupational standing into the IPUMS. Each measure is described further down in this document, under the heading "Occupational Standing Variables".

Harmonized Occupational and Industrial Coding: OCC1950, IND1950, OCC1990, IND1990

Occupation and industry are among the most problematic census variables in terms of comparability. The makers of each sample coded occupation into the contemporary Census Bureau classification scheme, which changed considerably over time. This variety of classifications presented the IPUMS project with one of its most challenging coding tasks.

The Census Bureau has a history of tinkering with occupational classifications from decade to decade. In some years - 1910, 1940, 1980, and 2000 - the Bureau dramatically reorganized the entire system. Table 1 presents some examples of different groupings used by the Bureau. Nineteenth-century occupational classifications focused more on work settings and economic sectors than on a worker's specific technical function. These classifications might reveal that someone worked in the iron-and-steel industry or was a railroad employee, without identifying his/her specific task or position. The Bureau tried to remedy this by classifying according to function as well as setting, and the number of categories exploded in the early twentieth century. In 1940, the Census Bureau finally adopted the socioeconomic classification of occupations championed by longtime Census agent and researcher Alba Edwards.¹ Edwards generally equated occupation with function, and relegated work setting and economic sector to a separate industry variable, contained in the IPUMS as IND, IND1950, and IND1990.

Table 1. Selected Census Bureau Occupational Groupings, 1880-2000
1880	1910	1950	1990	2000
Agriculture	Agriculture	Professional	Managerial and professional	Managerial and professional
Professional and personal service	Extraction of minerals	Farmers	Technical, sales, and administrative support	Service
Trade and transportation	Manufacturing and mechanical	Managers, officials, and proprietors	Service	Sales and Office
Manufacturing, mechanical, and mining	Transportation	Clerical	Farming, forestry, and fishing	Farming, fishing, and forestry
	Trade	Sales	Precision production, craft, and repair	Construction, extraction and maintenance
	Professional service	Craftsmen	Operators, fabricators, and laborers	Production, Transportation and material moving
	Domestic and personal service	Operatives	Military	Military
	Clerical occupations	Service
		Farm laborers
		Laborers

In addition to changes in classification, the way the occupation question was asked shifted subtly in 1940. Before then, a person was recorded as having an occupation if he or she was "gainfully employed" in the previous year. This amorphous concept posed particular problems of interpretation with respect to children, women, and seasonal employment. In 1940, the application of the labor-force concept defined participation as having worked for pay at any time within a particular reference week. Unpaid family workers could also be classified as part of the labor force if their work met certain criteria - see the documentation for the IPUMS variable EMPSTAT for a fuller discussion.

In order to design a compatible occupational classification system for the IPUMS, we had to choose a particular year as a standard. We originally picked 1950, and the corresponding 1950 occupational coding scheme, for a number of practical reasons. The 1950 census is fairly close to the middle of the IPUMS time series as it currently exists. All of the pre-1940 samples (except for 1910 cases with a SAMP1910 value of 5) had already coded occupation according to the 1950 classification. The 1950 system also exemplifies the status-hierarchy classification (i.e., first professionals, then clerical workers, then skilled workers, then laborers) with which social scientists have grown familiar. Furthermore, a great deal of historical work has either explicitly or implicitly relied upon this scheme. For example, Stephan Thernstrom's path-breaking mobility study, The Other Bostonians (1973),² relied upon the application of these mid-twentieth-century groupings to nineteenth-century data.

After the release of the 2000 census data, we created a parallel variable called OCC1990, based on the 1990 occupational classification scheme. Using the information from the occupational crosswalks, we traced the proportion of each occupation as it broke out into more specific occupations or as it was combined with others into a more general occupation.

Researchers at the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) then used the resulting tables to create aggregated occupational categories that were more useful for long-term analyses. More specifics on their methods and a detailed comparison of OCC1950 and OCC1990 can be found in the BLS Working Paper. We chose the 1990 scheme as the standard for OCC1990 so that no year's occupational data would be forced to bridge both of the two most significant changes in twentieth-century coding schemes: from 1970 to 1980 and from 1990 to 2000. In OCC1990, all samples from 1950 to the present bridge no more than one of these major shifts. For this reason, the variable may be preferable to OCC1950 for the samples from 1980 onward. Sensitivity testing suggests that OCC1990 performs very similarly to OCC1950 for most purposes. We subsequently created similarly integrated industry variables called IND1950 and IND1990.

We retained each sample's original occupation and industry codes in separate, unrecoded variables, called simply OCC (Occupation) and IND (Industry). Researchers who are less interested in change over time may prefer to use OCC and IND instead the harmonized versions of these variables available in OCC1950, IND1950, OCC1990, and IND1990. Doing so will allow them to avoid the anachronisms that are inevitably part of the harmonization process, and to more easily make distinctions that were especially meaningful during particular eras.

For research involving the 1850-1930 samples, using OCC in combination with OCC1950 can yield information not separately contained in either. As mentioned briefly above, the makers of these samples created two occupational variables. For the first, OCC, they translated census manuscript responses into the contemporary Census Bureau occupational classifications, as was done in all of the samples. For the second, OCC1950, they transcribed the manuscript responses directly into the OCC1950 format.

Our creation of OCC1950 and OCC1990 was greatly aided by a series of technical papers published by the U.S. Bureau of the Census. These papers provide data that describe the effects of post-1950 occupational classification changes: 1950-1960, 1960-1970, 1970-1980, 1990-2000. A parallel set of papers documents changes in industrial classifications between the following years: 1960-1970, 1970-1980, and 1990-2000.³

These papers provide detailed analyses of how the occupational and industrial coding schemes for each census year differed from the scheme used during the previous census year. Also called "crosswalks," these tables are based on samples of cases that are "double coded" into the occupational and industrial schemes of the current and previous census year. Using the information from the occupational crosswalks, we traced the proportion of each occupation as it broke out into more specific occupations or as it was combined with others into a more general occupation.

To take one example from the technical paper produced after the 1970 census: of persons coded as "Archivists and curators" in 1970, the Census Bureau determined that 60% would have been coded as "Miscellaneous social scientists" in 1960, while 40% would have been coded as "Professional, technical, and kindred workers, not elsewhere classified." The crosswalk from 1950-1960 then shows that the plurality of persons -- those coded as "Miscellaneous social scientists" in 1960 -- would have been coded as "Miscellaneous social scientists" in 1950. Thus, OCC1950 codes all "Archivists and curators" in the original 1970 occupational classification to "Miscellaneous social scientists. We generated the same information for every occupational code in every census year from the present back to 1950.

It should be noted that this "tracking" of the plurality assumes the even distribution of persons among the categories that subsequently get tracked to the next decade (a concern relevant only to 1970-2000). The major changes between the 1990 and 2000 occupational classification systems placed a particular strain on the OCC1950 assignment system. In a few extreme instances in the 2000 and ACS samples, we relied on common sense over the systematic use of Census Bureau crosswalks. Researchers particularly interested in the period from 1980 to the present should consider using the OCC1990 variable.⁴ The one exception for OCC1990 is that after following the techniques specified above, we aggregated the original 514 categories into 389 more general categories. This process is explained in more detail in the OCC1990 variable description.

With only a few anomalies (some residual categories and a few omissions), the technical papers are comprehensive in detailing occupational change from 1950 to 2000. Since the 1990 system was nearly identical to the one used in 1980, and the 1940 was very similar to 1950, incorporating these two years into OCC1950 required very little judgment on our part. With the exception of a small number of cases in the 1910 data, the pre-1940 samples already contained OCC1950, as described above.

We make no claims as to the continuity in the social setting or technical content of specific occupations across the one and half centuries covered by OCC1950 and the 75 years covered by OCC1990. The meanings of many occupational titles have obviously changed significantly from 1850 to the present. Still, we believe that the larger 1950 occupational groupings such as "professional" or "craftsman" are relatively accurate and consistent indicators of social status and general function. Furthermore, our experience suggests that the specific occupational titles are less subject to meaningful change than common historical wisdom would suggest. We also think that the 1950 codes generally work well as a means of locating individuals in the occupational structure as far back as the late nineteenth century. Ultimately, however, researchers must decide for themselves whether or not OCC1950 sufficiently answers the specific questions they are asking.

The OCC1990 variable poses fewer comparability problems, because of its more limited time span; but the reconciliation of different classification systems is inherently noisy, and some occupations are affected more than others. The same caveats apply to the parallel industry variables -- IND1950 and IND1990 -- but industrial classifications have generally been subject to less extreme transformations over the decades.

Occupational Standing Variables

The consistent occupational classification schemes employed in OCC1950 and OCC1990 are useful for many kinds of research, but some scholars require a numeric indicator of occupational standing suitable for advanced statistical techniques. To facilitate such research, IPUMS includes 11 measures of occupational standing, listed in Table 2. Six measures are based on the 1950 occupational classification system (OCC1950), and are available from 1850 to the present. The remaining five measures are based on the 1990 occupational classification system (OCC1990), and are available from 1950 to the present. Users conducting long-run historical research may wish to use the measures based on the 1950 system. For more modern research, the 1990-based measures are likely to be more appropriate.

Table 2. Occupational Standing Variables included in IPUMS
Variable name in IPUMS	Label	Years available in IPUMS	Occupational classification basis	Basis of score	Source data	Score varies across censuses
SEI	Duncan Socioeconomic Index	1850-present	1950	Income, Education, Prestige	1950 census, 1947 survey ⁵	No
NPBOSS50	Nam-Powers-Boyd Occupational Status Score	1850-present	1950	Earnings, Education	Each census	Yes (post-1950)
PRESGL	Siegel Prestige Score	1850-present	1950	Prestige	1960s surveys ⁵	No
EDSCOR50	Occupational Education Score	1850-present	1950	Education	Each census	Yes (post-1950)
ERSCOR50	Occupational Earnings Score	1850-present	1950	Earnings	Each census	Yes (post-1950)
OCCSCORE	Occupational Income Score	1850-present	1950	Income	1950 census	No
HWSEI	Hauser-Warren Socioeconomic Index	1950-present	1990	Earnings, Education, Prestige	1990 census 1989 GSS ⁵	No
NPBOSS90	Nam-Powers-Boyd Occupational Status Score	1950-present	1990	Earnings, Education	Each census	Yes (post-1950)
PRENT	Nakao-Treas Prestige Score	1950-present	1990	Prestige	1989 GSS ⁵	No
EDSCOR90	Occupational Education Score	1950-present	1990	Education	Each census	Yes (post-1950)
ERSCOR90	Occupational Earnings Score	1950-present	1990	Earnings	Each census	Yes (post-1950)

Table 2 indicates the basis upon which each measure is derived. Several variables are "composite" measures that combine 2 or more measurable dimensions of status. The remaining variables measure a single dimension, such as education, income, or prestige.

The fifth column indicates whether the measure is variant across censuses. In other words, whether a given OCC1950 or OCC1990 occupation receives the same score in each census, or whether the score is calculated anew for every census. Several measures are based on fixed-year data (i.e., scores are created once and those scores are applied to all other years, thus scores do not vary over time). These include the Duncan socioeconomic index, the Hauser-Warren socioeconomic index, the Siegel prestige score, the Nakao-Treas prestige score, and the Occupational income score. For example, the Duncan socioeconomic index was created using the 1950 census data and the 1947 North-Hatt Prestige data and do not vary over time.

For samples from 1950 to the present, some measures are based on specific census data (i.e., scores are created using each year's census data, thus scores vary over time) as indicated by "Varies" in the fifth column. For samples prior to 1950, all variables are based on 1950 data due to the lack of necessary variables. These include the Occupational education score, the Occupational earning score, and Nam-Powers-Boyd Occupational status score.

For some purposes, it is useful to hold the occupational standing measure constant over time to isolate the change in the occupational structure of incumbents. For other research, it may be desirable to allow change in the standing of the occupations themselves over time.

Composite measures of occupational standing: SEI, HWSEI, NPBOSS50, NPBOSS90

There are two types of composite measures of occupational standing in the IPUMS: Socioeconomic indexes (prestige-based scale) and Occupational status scores (pure socioeconomic scale). These measures are derived differently. Socioeconomic index is a weighted sum of the occupational income/earnings and education, in which the weight is determined by regressing prestige ratings on occupational income/earnings and education. Occupational status score, on the other hand, do not use prestige data, and give equal weight to occupational income/earnings and education.

There is significant debate about the usefulness of composite measures of occupational standing (these variables include SEI, HWSEI, NPBOSS50, and NPBOSS90). We strongly urge researchers to read our user note on this issue and to familiarize themselves with the debates surrounding the use of these variables.

SEI, Socioeconomic Index, 1950 basis

The Duncan socioeconomic index ⁶ used income and education data from the 1950 census data and the occupational prestige ratings of the 1947 National Opinion Research Center survey/the North-Hatt study. ⁷ Duncan regressed occupational prestige ratings on occupational income and education for a limited number of occupations. The resulting statistical model was used to generate socioeconomic scores for the entire range of 1950 occupation categories. The SEI is, therefore, the weighted sum of occupational education and occupational income. The measure is based on the OCC1950 classification and is the same for a given occupation across all census years. See the SEI variable description for more information.

HWSEI, Hauser-Warren Socioeconomic Index, 1990 basis

Hauser and Warren ⁸ updated the socioeconomic index using education and earnings data from the 1990 census and the occupational prestige ratings of the 1989 General Social Survey. Hauser and Warren regressed occupational prestige ratings on occupational earnings and education. The resulting statistical model was used to generate socioeconomic scores for the entire range of 1990 occupation categories. The HWSEI is, therefore, the weighted sum of occupational education and occupational earnings. The measure is based on the OCC1990 classification and is the same for a given occupation across all census years. See the HWSEI variable description for more information.

NPBOSS50, Nam-Powers-Boyd Occupational Status Score, 1950 basis
NPBOSS90, Nam-Powers-boyd Occupational Status Score, 1990 basis

Charles Nam and his colleagues have created occupational status scores since the 1950s. ⁹ Following their methodology, IPUMS staff members created Nam-Powers-Boyd occupational status scores in the IPUMS. NPBOSS variables are measures that equally weight earnings and education to calculate an occupational status score. The 1950 and 1990 measures are based on the OCC1950 and OCC1990 classifications, respectively. The measures can vary across census years for a given occupation. NPBOSS50 and NPBOSS90 were calculated based on the earnings and education levels of the employed civilian labor force aged 16 and above, excluding persons who did not work in the year prior to the census, ¹⁰ which is the same sample that Hauser and Warren used for their socioeconomic index. See the NPBOSS50 and NPBOSS90 variable descriptions for more information.

Components of composite measures - Prestige: PRESGL, PRENT

PRESGL, Siegel Prestige Score, 1950 basis

The Siegel Prestige score is based on the subjective evaluation of occupations collected in a series of surveys taken by the National Opinion Research Center (NORC) in the 1960s. ¹¹ The Siegel prestige score used the rating of occupations by survey respondents and was the first to cover all occupations from nationally representative survey. PRESGL is based on the OCC1950 classification and is the same for a given occupation across all census years. See the PRESGL variable description for more information.

PRENT, Nakao-Treas Prestige Score, 1990 basis

Nakao and Treas ¹² updated the prestige score using the 1989 General Social Survey (GSS) collected at NORC. Like the Siegel prestige score, Nakao-Treas prestige score used the rating of occupations by survey respondents. PRENT is based on the OCC1990 classification and is the same for a given occupation across all census years. See the PRENT variable description for more information.

Components of composite measures - Education: EDSCOR50, EDSCOR90

EDSCOR50, Occupational Education Score, 1950 basis
EDSCOR90, Occupational Education Score, 1990 basis

The occupational education scores indicate the percentage of persons in each occupation with one or more years of college education. The EDSCOR50 and EDSCOR90 were based on the education levels of the employed civilian labor force aged 16 and above, excluding persons who did not work in the year prior to the census. Occupational education score were calculated separately using the 1950 and 1990 occupational classification systems available in OCC1950 and OCC1990. The measures can vary across census years for a given occupation. See the EDSCOR50 and EDSCOR90 variable descriptions for more information.

Components of composite measures - Earnings/Income: ERSCOR50, ERSCOR90, OCCSCORE

ERSCOR50, Occupational Earnings Score, 1950 basis
ERSCOR90, Occupational Earnings Score, 1990 basis

Occupational earnings scores indicate the median earned income of persons in each occupation. In addition to wages, earned income includes income from one's own business or farm. Occupational earning scores were based on the education levels of the employed civilian labor force aged 16 and above, excluding persons who did not work in the year prior to the census, and calculated separately based on the 1950 and 1990 occupational classification systems available in OCC1950 and OCC1990. The measures can vary across census years for a given occupation. See the ERSCOR50 and ERSCOR90 variable description for more information.

The OCCSCORE and ERSCOR50 variables are conceptually quite similar. Both of them measure occupational economic standing. However, there are two significant differences between ERSCOR50 and OCCSCORE: (1) ERSCOR50 uses total personal earned income data from the public use samples and OCCSCORE uses total personal income from a published report with more cases (for 1950) and (2) ERSCOR50 is calculated separately for each census while OCCSCORE is largely invariant across censuses apart from minor variations in the post-1950 years mentioned below.

OCCSCORE, Occupational Income Score, 1950 basis

The occupational income score indicates the median total income -- in hundreds of dollars -- for persons in each occupation in 1950 with positive income. It is calculated using data from a published 1950 census report (See Table 19). For the post-1950 period, the score reflects the weighted average income of the 1950 occupational components of each contemporary occupation. ¹³ In practice, this has only a small effect, but it means that the measure can vary slightly across census years for a given occupation. See the OCCSCORE variable description for more information.

OCCSCORE provides a constructed income score based on the relative economic standing of occupations in 1950. We calculated median incomes for each occupation from data published by the Census Bureau in a 1956 Special Report on occupational characteristics. These data, based upon a 3.33 percent sample of the population, estimate the total income (not merely wage and salary) of all persons with any given occupation in 1950. We combined the median figures for men and women, which were presented separately in the published data. The 1950 occupational income we use is thus the weighted mean of the two median figures in hundreds of 1950 dollars. Although we used this 1950 income data in all cases, we calculated OCCSCORE differently for the pre-1950 and post-1950 census years. As the following discussion indicates, researchers must understand this difference in order to correctly interpret the score.

Post-1950: We designed OCCSCORE to account for some of the effects of post-1950 changes in occupational classification. As described above, we used Census Bureau technical documentation to recode post-1950 occupations into the 1950 system by determining how the largest subgroup of a given occupation would have been coded under each preceding system. OCCSCORE, however, retains all of the component subgroups within the various occupational categories as they are tracked back to 1950. It then calculates the occupational income scores as a weighted average of the 1950 incomes of each category's component subgroups. Therefore, post-1950 Occupational income scores represent the weighted average of 1950 median income of the component subgroups of each occupational category for each year, as recoded into the 1950 system.

Table 3 demonstrates the process of tracking occupations and weighting the scores by the economic standing of occupations in 1950. Column A shows the three occupations into which 1980 patternmakers would have been coded under the 1970 system. Column B breaks each 1970 occupation into its 1960 components. Column C tracks 1960 occupations into 1950, providing a list of all the 1950 occupations into which 1980 patternmakers would have been classified. Column D gives the final distribution of 1980 patternmakers among 1950 occupations after tracking the pieces over all intervening years. The final score for 1980 patternmakers is 35 ($3,500 in 1950). Without the weighting procedure, the plurality-based method would have resulted in the 1950 patternmaker score of 34. The inclusion of persons in 1980 who in previous years would have been identified as toolmakers and designers raised the score by one point after weighting. This procedure was carried out separately for every occupation in each census from 1960 to 1990.

Table 3. Derivation of the Income Score (OCCSCORE) for the Occupation "Patternmaker" in 1980
% Occupation	% Occupation	% Occupation	%
Column A 1980 patternmakers broken down into 1970 occupational components	Column B 1970 component occupations broken down into 1960 occupational components	Column C 1960 component occupations broken down into 1950 occupational components	Column D (=ABC) Proportion of 1980 patternmakers in each 1950 occupational component	Column E Income Scores of 1950 occupational components	Column F (=D*E) Income score weight by component
17.57 Designers	93.00 Designers	100.00 Designers	16.34	38	6.21
	2.20 Professionals nec	90.10 Professionals, nec	.35	33	.12
		8.09 Attendants, service	.03	13	.00
		1.39 Architects	.01	54	.01
		.41 Agents, nec	.00	36	.00
	4.79 Operatives, nec	99.78 Operatives,	.84	23	.19
		.16 Truck drivers	.00	25	.00
		.02 Excavators	.00	31	.00
		.02 Asbestos workers	.00	32	.00
		.02 Craftsmen, nec	.00	32	.00
48.12 Patternmakers	96.76 Patternmakers	100.00 Patternmakers	46.56	34	15.83
	3.23 Operatives, nec	99.78 Operatives, nec	1.55	23	.36
		.16 Truck drivers	.00	25	.00
		.02 Excavators	.00	31	.00
		.02 Asbestos workers	.00	32	.00
		.02 Craftsmen, nec	.00	32	.00
34.31 Tool-and-die makers	95.13 Toolmakers	100.00 Toolmakers	32.64	37	12.08
	4.87 Machinists	100.00 Machinists	1.67	32	.53
Final weighted occupational score (sum of F):					35.33

"nec"=not elsewhere classified
Explanation:
Column A:	The occupational distribution of 1980 Patternmakers as they would have been classified in 1970.
Column B:	The occupational distribution of each 1970 component occupation as it would have been classified in 1960.
Column C:	The occupational distribution of each 1960 component occupation as it would have been classified in 1950.
Column D:	The proportion of 1980 Patternmakers as they would have been classified in 1950 (column A * column B*column C).
Column E:	The median income (in hundreds of dollars) of the 1950 component occupations in column D.
Column F:	The amount of 1980 income score contributed by each 1950 component occupation (column D * column E).

Pre-1950: The pre-1950 income scores were calculated differently. For the years prior to 1950, the data upon which the aforementioned weighting procedure is based are not available. Consequently, as same as all other occupational standing variables, the 1950 occupational income data provide the sole basis of income score assignment for the earlier samples.

The question of change over time in the relative incomes of occupations should elicit caution among users. For the post-1950 period, weighting controls for classification shifts, but not for change in occupational incomes over time. The applicability of the 1950 scores to 1920 and before is also open to question, given the length of elapsed time and the lack of individual income data. This issue might be resolved by empirical investigation using other sources.

Although OCCSCORE is derived from individual-level data, it is not the same as actual personal income. The income scores are simply a tool for economically scaling occupations - essentially a way of turning occupation into a continuous measure. An occupation with a high score is a well-rewarded and probably high-status occupation, but note that the measure is an economic score, not a socioeconomic one. Depending on one's perspective, some aspects of social status may be better reflected in the Census Bureau's grouping of occupations in 1950 than in the IPUMS income score. The divide between manual and nonmanual work or the identification of craftsmen (skilled laborers) are among the distinctions better made through occupational titles and groups.

ENDNOTES:

Alba Edwards, A Social-Economic Grouping of the Gainful Workers of the United States (Washington D.C.: GPO, 1938).
Stephan Thernstrom, The Other Bostonians: Poverty and Progress in the American Metropolis, 1880-1970 (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1973).
United States Bureau of the Census, Changes Between the 1950 and 1960 Occupation and Industry Classifications (technical paper 18 prepared by J.A. Priebe), 1968; 1970 Occupation and Industry Classifications in Terms of their 1960 Occupation and Industry Elements (technical paper 26 prepared by J.A. Priebe, J. Heinkel, and S. Greene), 1972; The Relationship Between the 1970 and 1980 Industry and Occupation Classification Systems (technical paper 59 prepared by P. Vines and J.A. Priebe), 1989.
For several occupations from the 2000 and American Community Survey samples, we chose not to follow the logic of using the official Census Bureau crosswalks. For all of the occupations listed below, common sense suggested a better OCC/OCC1950 match than did the usual crosswalk-based process:
OCC value 171 was placed in OCC1950 value 069 (Atmospheric and space scientists);
OCC value 176 was placed in OCC1950 value 069 (Physical scientists, all other);
OCC value 270 was placed in OCC1950 value 001 (Actors);
OCC value 643 was placed in OCC1950 value 565 (Paperhangers);
OCC value 752 was placed in OCC1950 value 554 (Commercial divers).
Surveys are conducted at National Opinion Research Center. See General Social Survey Documentation for more information.
Otis Dudley Duncan, "A Socioeconomic Index for All Occupations," in A. Reiss et al., Occupations and Social Status (Free Press, 1961).
North, Cecil C. and Paul K. Hatt. 1949. "Jobs and Occupations: A popular Evaluation." Opinion News 9: 3-13.
Hauser, Robert M. and John Robert Warren. 1997. "Socioeconomic Indexes for Occupations: A Review, Update, and Critique." Sociological Methodology 27: 177-298.
Nam, Charles B. and Monica Boyd. 2004. "Occupational Status in 2000: Over a Century of Census-Based Measurement." Population Research and Policy Review 23: 327-358. Nam, Charles B. and Mary G. Powers. 1968. "Changes in the Relative Status of Workers in the United States, 1950-1960." Social Forces 47: 158-170.
Sample used to create occupational education score, occupational earning score, and Nam-Powers-Boyd occupational status score is the same as that used by Hauser and Warren ⁸ in their calculation of socioeconomic index, that is employed civilians who have worked in previous year and aged above 16. For users who are interested in selecting the sample: the sample includes EMPSTATD (Employment status, detailed) = 10 (Employed, at work) and 12 (Employed, has job, not working) and age >= 16 and WORKEDYR (worked last year) = 2 (yes) ( in 1950 WORKEDYR is not available, thus, we used WKSWORK1 (weeks worked last year) > 0 ).
Siegel, Paul M. 1971. Prestige in the American Occupational Structure. Unpublished doctoral dissertation. University of Chicago.
Nakao, Keiko and Judith Treas. 1994. "Updating Occupational Prestige and Socioeconomic Scores: How the New Measures Measure UP." Sociological Methodology 24: 1-72.
Sobek, Matthew. 1995. "The Comparability of Occupations and the Generation of Income Scores." Historical Methods 28(1): 47-51.