United States: 1960, 1970, 1980, 1990

United States 1960-1970: Persons age 14+ who had worked within the previous ten years; not new workers (see note).
United States 1980-1990: Persons age 16+ who had worked within the previous five years; not new workers (see note).
NOTE: "New workers" are persons seeking employment for the first time who have not yet secured their first job.

OCC95US provides a consistent classification of occupation across U.S. samples. Occupation describes the type of (usually market-oriented) work the person performs.

OCC95US recodes information contained in the variable OCC into the 1950 U.S. Census Bureau occupational classification system. Codes above 970 are non-occupational responses retained in the historical census samples. OCC95US is intended to enhance the comparability of occupational data across all U.S. samples.

In order to make the "armed forces" occupation (code 595) as comparable as possible, IPUMS-International uses EMPSTAT to recode military personnel to this category in 1960-1990. In 1960-1980 these persons were recoded out of the "not applicable" category. In 1990, however, recoding would result in lost information. Members of the military in the 1990 sample were asked about occupation and often reported their specific line of work rather than simply "armed forces." IPUMS-International retains this 1990 information in the unrecoded OCC variable.

User Caution: The translation of occupation codes into the 1950 classification is particularly problematic for 1980 and 1990. A significant reorganization of the classification scheme between the 1970 and 1980 censuses means that comparisons across those years will be more distorted than similar comparisons across other decades.