Dimensions of occupational inequality and Duncan's socioeconomic index

Using the original 1962 Blau and Duncan data for white males, I compare relative amounts of inequality in the distributions of occupational prestige, earnings, autonomy, and job skills. Also assessed are the degree of status rigidity (or intercorrelations) among these four dimensions of occupational inequality and the simultaneous relations among these four dimensions in a father-to-son occupational mobility model. These findings are compared to those obtained with Duncan's socioeconomic index to determine whether additional information can be obtained when using independent measures representing the multiple dimensions of occupational inequality versus using the SEI alone. Only minor discrepancies are found, and these relate to autonomy and earnings.An earlier version of this paper was presented at the 1985 Pacific Sociological Association meetings.