Measuring social class

Measuring social class

1. Occupation

   • often used due to being linked to factors such as:
     • Levels of pay
     • Working conditions
     • Social status

2. The Registrar Generals Scale

   • This scale allocated people to a class based on their occupation.
     • Distinguished between MANUAL and NON-MANUAL.
       • Manual
         • Require physical effort and can be anything from skilled to unskilled.
       • Non-manual
         • Don't require physical effort.
   • Middle class in this scale was:
     • Skilled non-manual occupations
     • Managerial occupations
     • Technical occupations
     • Proffessional occupations
   • PROBLEMS
     • Difficult to place people without jobs, eg students retired and unemployed people.
     • Jobless married women were assessed on her husbands occupation which may be incorrect or mis-leading.
     • Upper class and property owners weren't easy to place based on their occupations.
     • If people had the same job or occupation there can still be differences in:
       • Wealth
       • Status
       • income
       • Qualifications

3. National Statistics Socio-economic Classification

   • This classification addresses some of the problems with the registrar scale
   • Uses occupation but can cover the whole population including unemployed people, or students
   • The NS-SEC groups together the occupations that are similar in:
     • Rewards that are given to workers for example pay and career prospectus as well as job security.
     • Employment status: looks at what status they are employer, self-employed or employee
     • Levels of authority and control: It looks at whether someone is responsible for other workers or whether they are being supervised by others.