F. Lancaster Jones

Assumptions of social mobility research in the U.S.: The case of occupational status☆

Abstract This paper examines the theoretical and empirical basis for common rank-orderings of occupational roles by raters throughout the world. From an illustrative comparison of occupational stratification in Australia and the United States we conclude tentatively that (1) commonalities in the socioeconomic characteristics of occupational roles provide the basis for interplace consistencies in “prestige” scores, (2) the structure of occupational mobility in the U.S. and Australia is largely similar, (3) this similar structure of occupational stratification manifests a common socioeconomic process which defines a (the?) major component of occupational mobility in capitalist, industrial (only?) societies. We infer that “prestige” scores for occupations are fallible estimates of the socioeconomic statuses of occupation, within the context of mobility processes in (at least) the U.S. and Australia.

A Social Ranking of Melbourne Suburbs

MANY studies of social stratification systems in Western towns and cities have recognized the importance of the residential area as an indicator of social position. It is a matter of casual as well as sociological observation that the residential areas of cities tend to be ranked invidiously in terms of social prestige. Warner’s use of the dwelling area as a component indicator in his Index of Social Characteristics,’ t Hollingshead’s adoption of a residential scale in his Index of Social Position,~ and the logic underlying the dimension of Social Rank in social area analysis3 all recognize the importance of place of residence in identifying or at least approximating a person’s general social status.

Occupational Achievement in Australia and the United States: A Comparative Path Analysis

In this paper, Blau and Duncans model of the process of occupational achievement in the United States is applied to comparable Australian data. A path analysis indicates that the major difference between the two countries, at least in terms of the model considered, is a looser articulation between the educational and occupational systems in Australia. Separate analysis of different age cohorts indicates a convergence between the two countries, reflecting the rapid industrialization and expansion of tertiary education in Australia since the end of the Second World War.

Supplement: An Occupational Classification of the Australian Workforce

A QUESTION relating to occupation has been included in all federal censuses of Australia. Although, as the Appendix indicates, the form of this occupational question has remained largely the same, the Bureau of Census and Statistics has tabulated responses in varying ways, partly because of changes in Australia’s occupational structure but also because of some dissatisfaction with the classificatory schemed I Moreover, the number of occupational categories and the detail of cross-tabulations between occupation and other population characteristics have been modified from one census to another. In 1933 almost 1,000 occupations

Father-to-Son Mobility: Australia in Comparative Perspective

This report of findings from the first national survey of social stratification and social mobility conducted in Australia attempts to fill a gap noticed by students interested in the comparative analysis of mobility … The findings of our Australian survey serve as the point of departure for comparisons with recent data for Italy and the United States…

Is It True What They Say About Daddy

The traditional method for assesing generational mobility hass been exposed to remeasurement studies but not to the test of an alternative questioning strategy. This paper describes a design in which intergenerational mobility is studies from two perspectives. In the conventional approach sons report on their own statuses and give proxy reports for parental statuses. In our second perspective parents are questioned about themselves and give proxy information on their children. Estimates of a five-variable status-attainment model for eachperspective yield similar results, but some correlations and regressions differ significantly because nonrandom errors influence the reporting of socioeconomic data among adults. Our anomalous findings suggest that mobility researchers might consider employing both questioning strategies as a guide to potential biases until a definitive test shows that the caution prescribed in this paper is unwarranted. Consumers of mobility studies are entitled to reserve judgment on data that depend entirely on the traditional approach even though current research adheres to it almost without exception.

Measurement of Occupational Status in Comparative Analysis

With the increasing use of sophisticated measurement techniques in status attainment research, more attention has been given to the effects of operational definitions on substantive interpretation. This paper reports the results of recoding and recalibrating 1965 Australian mobility data. It is shown that coding unreliability has negligible impact on estimated correlations between fathers, first, and current jobs, but that different coding rules and different metrics may affect substantive results. A revised comparison of the process of status attainment in Australia and the United States confirms the artifactual nature of some differences found in an earlier comparison and shows that a new Australian status scale gives equivalent results to Duncans SEI. The farm sector aside, the process of status attainment in Australia and the United States is basically the same, and the effective equivalence of ANU II and Duncans SEI scale means that future comparisons of status attainment (at least in the nonfarm sector) can be made without recourse to extensive data recalibration.

A Social Profile of Canberra, 1961

Tms paper reports an application of multivariate techniques to the analysis of census data relating to Canberra in 1961, the first Australian census to yield a range of detailed areal statistics comparable to the census tract data available for some cities in the United States for just over fifty years. These data provide summary statistics for the populations of census collectors’ districts (CDs are the basic areal units of enumeration in Australian censuses) relating to such characteristics as age, conjugal condition, religion, birthplace and period of residence of the foreign-born, nationality, workforce composition, and dwellings. 1 They constitute an important research material for studying urban social organization and provide a means of investigating in detail the nature and extent of the areal differentiation of social categories in Australian cities. In the United States census

Worker traits and worker functions in DOT

Abstract Some users of the worker traits ratings and worker function hierarchies in DOT do not seem to be fully aware that the two systems are in large part redundant: the worker traits can be efficiently summarized by the ratings of worker functions (level of complexity of working with data, people and things). This paper, a by-product of an extension of DOT to the Australian Census Classification of Occupations, attempts to validate the worker function hierarchies in terms of the worker traits required by different jobs in DOT. It shows empirically that the variation in worker traits across the 21,741 occupations listed in DOT is closely reflected in the 197 worker function profiles, which have the better research potential.

Occupational Prestige in A ustralia and Canada: A Comparison and Validation of Some Occupational Scales

* Department of Sociology, McMaster University, Hamilton, Ontario. † Department of Sociology, Research School of Social Sciences, the Australian National University, Canberra 2600. STUDIES of social stratification in Australia have been hampered by the absence of inclusive scales of occupational prestige. In 1965 Broom, Jones and Zubrzycki published as a supplement to Volume 1 (Number 2) of this Journal an occupational classification designed for analysis of census and survey data. Subsequently, that scale was shortened into sixteen occupational groups arranged as a prestige hierarchy. As Broom and Jones (1969: 651) put it: The occupational scale, in terms of which career mobility is analyzed, was derived in