Reevaluating the uses of status: The case of earnings determination

Status and prestige variables and measures have been central to the sociological study of individual variations in income and other dependent variables for at least 2 decades. Yet theoretical and methodological rationales for the use of such variables in the explanation of income are problematic. This conclusion, along with some similar conclusions about other uses of status and prestige variables and measures, were reached after a review of Weberian, functionalist, and other prominent discussions of the uses of status/prestige in theory and research on income. It is suggested that an emphasis upon structural attributes of jobs is more promising than a continued emphasis upon evaluatory, status/prestige conceptions of jobs for effective theorizing about income determination. A quantitative analysis of earnings shows that income effects of a common measure of socio-economic status disappear in the context of a rudimentary structural model of income. It is concluded that social scientists should move on to use more varied attributes of jobs and exercise more caution in the use of status and prestige variables.