View original document

The full text on this page is automatically extracted from the file linked above and may contain errors and inconsistencies.

BUFFALO BRANCH, FEDERAL RESERVE BANK OF NEW YORK

THE REGIONAL ECONOMY

OF UPSTATE NEW YORK

The Changing Composition of Upstate New York’s Workforce
Fall 2003
Buffalo Branch, Federal
Reserve Bank of New York
160 Delaware Avenue
Buffalo, NY 14202
Tel: (716)849-5023
Fax: (716) 849-5218
www.newyorkfed.org/
buffalo

Barbara Walter
Senior Vice President and
Branch Manager

Reggie Melson
Community Affairs
Representative
reggie.melson@ny.frb.org

Richard Deitz, Ph.D.
Regional Economist
richard.deitz@ny.frb.org

▼▼▼▼▼▼▼▼▼

To view the latest results
of the Empire State
Manufacturing Survey,
visit:
http://www.newyorkfed.org/
research/regional_economy/
empiresurvey_overview.html

For the online version
of this newsletter and
other economic research
published by the Federal
Reserve Bank of New
York, visit:
http://www.newyorkfed.org/
research/regional_economy/
upstatenews.html

In recent decades, the economy of upstate
New York has undergone significant
structural changes—permanent shifts in the
composition of economic activity. Industry
employment trends are one indicator of these
changes: job losses in industries like steel and
automobiles, paired with job gains in services
such as education and commercial banking,
point to the decline of manufacturing and
the attendant rise of a service economy in
the region. Another important indicator of
structural change, however, is a shift in the
occupational makeup of the region. While
workers can transfer their skills from one
industry to another—moving, say, from a
clerical position in a hospital to a similar
position in a university—they cannot change
occupations without undergoing considerable
retraining. Given the difficulty of making such
a change, pronounced shifts in a region’s
occupational composition provide strong
evidence that a fundamental restructuring of
the workforce is under way.
In this issue of The Regional Economy
of Upstate New York, we use newly available
data from the 2000 census to assess the
occupational composition of the upstate
New York workforce and to analyze how it
has changed since the 1990 census. We also
compare the evolving mix of occupations in
our region with that of the nation as a whole,
an approach that allows us to identify upstate
New York’s areas of specialization and some
unique features of the changes in the region’s
labor market.
Our analysis reveals that the largest
occupations in the region—as in the nation—
are office and administrative support, retail
and sales, management, and production.
Compared with the nation, upstate New
York has particularly high concentrations of
workers in production, education, healthcare,
and community and social services. We also
find that regional workers in the occupations
of management, construction, community and
social services, protection, and farming tend
to earn higher wages than workers in those
occupations on a national level, while regional

wages in retail and sales and in computer and
mathematical occupations tend to be lower
than the nation’s.
Our comparison of the 1990 and 2000
census data on occupations indicates that
while upstate New York’s overall employment
growth fell far short of the nation’s, some
smaller occupations—education, healthcare,
and community and social services—grew
at roughly the same pace in the region as
they did in the nation. However, the larger
occupations of office and administrative
support, construction, and retail and sales
actually shrank in upstate New York while
they grew—albeit slowly—nationwide.
Generally, upstate New York gained
jobs in high-paying occupations, as did the
nation. But while employment in low-paying
occupations grew very slowly nationwide, it
contracted in upstate New York. Despite this
difference, the region and the nation were alike
in experiencing an increase in the share of jobs
in high-wage occupations and a decrease in the
share of jobs in low-wage occupations over the
1990-2000 period.

The Occupational Data Advantage
Regional economic research tends to focus
on industry employment trends. The newly
implemented North American Industry
Classification System (NAICS) has made such
analysis more precise by refining and updating
industry categories.1 Industry employment
statistics group workers according to the
industries in which they work, but do not
identify the type of work performed by
individual workers. For example, managers in
a manufacturing plant are included under the
same industry code as the plant’s production
and office workers despite vast differences in
their skills and wages. Furthermore, industrylevel data fail to capture changes in the type of
work performed within an industry. A firm may,
for example, reduce its production workers but
increase its research and development staff.
While this change may cause little net change
in industry-level employment, it represents a
significant change in the nature and makeup
of the workforce.

THE REGIONAL ECONOMY
Table 1

Occupation Employment Shares (percent)
SOC Group

U.S. Buffalo Rochester Albany Syracuse Utica Binghamton

Office and administrative support

15.5

16.6

14.9

17.9

15.7

17.0

15.3

Retail and Sales

11.3

11.2

10.4

10.0

11.3

9.7

11.0

Management

8.6

7.8

8.5

8.5

7.6

6.4

7.4
9.7

Production occupations

8.5

9.4

10.3

5.7

9.1

10.0

Transportation and material moving

6.2

6.0

5.1

5.6

5.9

5.9

5.9

Education, training, and library

5.7

6.9

7.0

6.9

7.4

6.6

6.8

Construction and extraction

5.5

3.5

3.7

4.2

4.1

3.9

4.2

Food preparation and serving

4.8

5.6

5.0

4.7

5.2

5.2

5.3

Healthcare practitioners & technicians

4.6

6.0

5.3

5.7

5.6

6.1

5.2

Business and financial operations

4.3

4.0

3.9

5.1

3.7

3.7

3.6

Installation, maintenance, & repair

3.9

3.7

3.5

3.5

4.1

3.9

3.2

Cleaning & maintenance

3.3

2.8

2.6

2.7

3.2

3.3

3.2

Personal care and service

2.5

2.4

3.0

2.5

2.6

3.0

2.6

Computer and mathematical

2.4

1.6

3.0

2.8

1.7

1.1

3.5

Architecture and engineering

2.1

1.9

3.2

2.5

2.1

1.6

3.2

Healthcare support

2.0

2.6

2.3

2.3

2.2

3.4

2.8
1.8

Protective services

2.0

2.3

1.7

2.0

2.1

3.1

Arts, entertainment, sports, and media

1.9

1.4

1.8

1.7

1.7

1.3

1.3

Community and social services

1.5

1.8

1.8

2.1

1.9

2.2

1.8

Legal

1.1

1.2

0.8

1.6

1.0

0.7

0.7

Life, physical, and social sciences

0.9

0.8

1.2

1.3

0.7

0.5

0.6

Farming, fishing, and forestry
Farmers and farm managers

0.7
0.6

0.2
0.2

0.4
0.4

0.3
0.4

0.6
0.6

0.7
0.8

0.5
0.4

14.2

12.5

15.6

15.4

12.4

9.8

14.8

9.9

10.8

10.4

12.1

10.0

10.2

9.4

Mid wage ($30,000 - $40,000)

18.6

17.3

17.9

18.4

19.1

17.8

17.3

Mid-low wage ($20,000 - $30,000)
Low wage (< $20,000)

45.4
11.4

48.2
11.0

44.8
10.9

43.5
10.3

46.4
11.5

49.1
12.2

46.5
11.6

High wage (> $50,000)
Mid-high wage ($40,000 - $50,000)

Sources: U.S. Bureau of the Census, Summary File 3 (2000); U.S. Department of Labor, Occupational Employment Survey (2001).
Notes: The figures in bold represent employment shares that are approximately 20 percent higher than the corresponding U.S. shares.
Wage groups are based on the median U.S. wage and aggregated from the twenty-three SOC occupation groups. Farmers and farm
managers are not included in wage aggregations because median wage data are not available for this group.

Upstate New York’s Occupational Distribution

Occupation-level data group workers with similar education,
skills, and wages. For example, office and administrative support
workers are classed together, regardless of whether they work
in education or business. As a consequence, occupational data
can tell us much about the basic composition of the labor
force. While industry employment data reveal general shifts
in the relative importance of different industries, occupational
data allow us to identify changes in the type of work that is
actually being done and the skills that the economy demands.
Thus, the occupational data can provide a much more precise
characterization of restructuring in the labor force.

By applying the SOC’s breakdown of occupations to the 2000
census data, we can assess the size and importance of individual
occupations (Table 1). We find that in both upstate New York
and the nation, the largest occupation—that is, the occupation
commanding the largest share of employment—is office and
administrative support. The employment share of this occupation
in all upstate metropolitan areas is near the national average
of 15 percent. Albany has an especially large share—nearly 18
percent—reflecting the fact that many of its workers directly or
indirectly provide services for the state government. The next
largest occupation in upstate New York and the nation is retail
and sales, with employment shares ranging between roughly 10
and 11 percent. Management and production work also figure
in the top four occupations in the nation and most upstate metro
areas.

To analyze data at the occupation level, we draw on the
Standard Occupation Classification (SOC) system, which is
currently used by all federal statistical agencies to categorize
workers by occupation. Like the industrial classification system,
the SOC has recently been modernized. The updated version is
now being implemented by most data collection agencies.2

Buffalo Branch - FRBNY

Employment shares for some occupations are markedly larger
in the region than in the nation, suggesting that upstate metro
2

Table 2

Median Annual Wage by Occupation Group
SOC Group
U.S. Buffalo Rochester Albany Syracuse Utica Binghamton
Management

64,220

66,370

73,250

71,090

67,760

59,510

65,460

Computer and mathematical

57,650

47,970

58,150

51,840

50,460

46,340

58,840

Legal

56,220

44,610

75,180

62,430

58,850

51,070

44,980

Architecture and engineering

53,630

49,220

56,280

53,610

50,720

49,470

57,140

Business and financial operations

45,720

42,460

45,640

45,800

43,760

36,010

44,580

Life, physical, and social sciences

44,770

43,810

46,720

46,210

43,820

37,550

42,010

Healthcare practitioners & technicians

42,770

39,340

40,330

41,370

39,810

38,860

36,840

Education, training, and library

36,210

35,660

37,040

40,680

40,050

38,930

34,240

Arts, entertainment, sports, and media

33,670

27,910

33,180

31,100

27,490

26,200

27,440

Installation, maintenance, & repair

33,110

33,230

36,880

33,810

32,870

29,550

30,340

Construction and extraction

32,390

37,670

34,680

36,550

34,600

32,110

32,000

Community and social services

31,440

31,320

33,010

35,730

34,280

27,820

32,730

Protective services

28,410

35,830

35,830

39,580

32,210

38,480

31,400

Office and administrative support

25,050

24,200

24,700

26,570

24,660

22,610

22,020

Production

24,570

27,650

27,170

26,520

25,280

21,820

23,240

Transportation

22,800

23,770

22,180

24,830

23,330

20,830

21,100

Healthcare support

20,490

21,730

20,960

20,390

20,610

18,940

19,970

Retail and Sales

20,040

17,880

17,860

18,860

17,940

17,650

17,130

Cleaning & maintenance

18,120

17,980

17,590

19,600

18,000

17,630

18,270

Personal care and service

17,230

15,840

16,640

18,030

17,570

15,010

15,550

Farming, fishing, and forestry
Food preparation and serving

16,140
14,820

19,760
14,050

19,040
14,010

16,590
15,500

19,690
14,280

20,890
13,740

18,190
14,290

Source: U.S. Department of Labor, Occupational Employment Survey (2001).
Note: Median wage data are not available for the farmers and farm managers occupation group.
* This figure is the average of the 1999 and 2000 wage figures because 2001 data were unavailable.

to those of workers nationwide, but with some differences (Table
2). According to the U.S. Department of Labor’s Occupational
Employment Survey, the highest paid occupations in both the
region and the United States are management, computer and
mathematical work, law, and architecture and engineering.
Nationwide, wages are lowest in farming, food preparation,
and personal care; upstate, these occupations are also among
the most modestly compensated.

areas have certain areas of specialization. With the exception
of Albany, upstate metro areas have a high concentration of
production workers – nearly 10 percent, compared with 8.5
percent nationwide. Education and training also account for
an above-average share of employment in upstate New York—
roughly 7 percent or more compared with the national share of
5.7 percent. A third area of specialization is healthcare, where two
occupation groups—practitioners and healthcare support—have
combined employment shares that are 1 to 2 percentage points
higher in the region than in the nation. In addition, community
and social services account for a larger share of employment in
every upstate metro area than in the nation. Also notable are the
relatively high concentrations of some occupations in particular
upstate metro areas: architects and engineers in Rochester,
Albany, and Binghamton; the life, physical, and social sciences
in Rochester and Albany; and business and financial operations
in Albany.

In general, upstate workers in management, construction,
social services, protection, and farming tend to earn higher wages
than workers in these same occupations nationwide, while the
region’s wages tend to be below the nation’s in computer and
mathematical work and in retail and sales. Production workers
earn relatively high wages in Buffalo, Rochester, and Albany.
Wages in almost every occupation group in Rochester and Albany
tend to roughly equal or exceed the corresponding national
wages, and Rochester’s median wage in legal occupations is
particularly high. Workers in most occupation groups in Utica
and Binghamton earn less than workers nationwide, although
three of the four most highly compensated occupations pay
more in Binghamton than in the nation. Buffalo and Syracuse
present a mixed picture: wages for managers in both metropolitan
areas exceed the national median, while wages in many of the
remaining high-wage occupations tend to fall below the national
median.

Some occupations are, however, less well represented in
upstate New York than in the nation as a whole. Construction
accounts for a markedly lower share of employment in all of
the region’s metro areas than in the nation. Moreover, computer
and mathematical occupations have a relatively low employment
share in Buffalo, Syracuse, and Utica.

Earnings by Occupation
A review of annual earnings in the various SOC occupational
groups reveals that upstate workers’ wages are broadly comparable

We also stratified occupations into five wage groups, from
high-paying occupations to low-paying occupations, to compare
3

THE REGIONAL ECONOMY
Table 3

Percentage Employment Growth by Occupation Group: 1990 - 2000
SOC Group
U.S. Buffalo Rochester Albany Syracuse Utica Binghamton
Computer and mathematical

113.4

19.4

102.4

90.8

21.2

-15.3

89.9

Community and social services

43.4

42.2

34.0

56.9

40.2

73.2

17.5

Legal

33.6

22.5

-20.2

51.2

-2.1

-26.8

-43.5

Healthcare practitioners & technicians

30.1

43.7

15.2

24.5

25.0

48.5

-5.5

Management

29.6

15.6

18.2

5.5

6.6

6.5

-1.2

Education, training, and library

29.0

31.0

25.1

21.8

31.7

26.3

7.4

Business and financial operations

25.2

13.1

5.5

21.0

-1.0

15.4

-5.6

Personal care and service

24.7

-0.8

36.9

21.5

12.7

17.8

1.3

Protective services

23.9

6.7

11.5

12.1

7.3

17.9

19.3

Installation, maintenance, & repair

21.0

2.3

-3.7

13.2

11.6

5.4

-15.3

Healthcare support

20.7

24.7

24.8

26.4

14.7

56.4

21.7

Food preparation and serving

13.6

3.0

5.7

3.3

5.6

-7.2

-7.2

Arts, entertainment, sports, and media

13.3

-32.3

-17.4

-21.7

-23.3

-34.4

-48.4

Transportation

10.5

-1.8

-0.8

0.8

-3.6

9.5

2.4

Construction and extraction

7.2

-38.1

-32.2

-11.9

-28.3

-32.0

-25.9

Retail and Sales

4.1

-13.9

-3.8

-11.5

-8.8

-13.1

-6.0

Office and administrative support

2.5

-5.2

-8.6

-13.0

-12.7

-4.4

-6.9

Cleaning & maintenance

0.4

-20.2

-21.2

-13.5

-9.6

-19.2

-17.7
-60.8

Life, physical, and social sciences

-0.4

-27.6

-4.9

5.3

-40.1

-57.6

Production occupations

-7.1

-10.9

-8.6

-19.9

-6.7

-10.5

-7.0

Farming, fishing, and forestry

-8.9

-38.7

-24.3

-38.8

-10.4

-22.9

-18.4

Architecture and engineering
Farmers and farm managers

-10.6
-22.2

-29.0
-48.0

8.4
-22.4

-16.8
-23.4

-26.6
-11.8

-37.9
0.4

-12.8
-30.4

High wage (> $50,000)

30.2

6.5

22.6

13.5

-0.1

-9.7

3.9

Mid-high wage ($40,000 - $50,000)

24.4

22.6

8.9

20.7

6.5

22.3

-13.1

Mid wage ($30,000 - $40,000)

19.4

-3.3

-2.2

8.0

3.5

-0.1

-12.8

0.4

-6.3

-7.6

-13.2

-9.4

-4.7

-5.6

8.4
11.8

-6.4
-2.0

0.8
1.2

-2.7
0.5

-2.7
-2.4

-2.1
-1.3

-3.8
-6.0

Mid-low wage ($20,000 - $30,000)
Low wage (< $20,000)
Total

Sources: U.S. Bureau of the Census, Summary File 3 (2000); U.S. Department of Labor, Occupational Employment Survey (2001).
Notes: Wage groups are based on the median U.S. wage and aggregated from the twenty-three SOC occupation groups.
Farmers and farm managers are not included in wage aggregations because median wage data are not available for this group.

Occupational Changes over the 1990s

the percentage of workers employed in each group in upstate
New York and the nation (Table 1, bottom five rows). Despite
differences between the region and the nation in the employment
shares for individual occupations, differences in employment
shares for the five broad wage groups are nominal.3 About 24
percent of workers nationwide work in the two highest wage
aggregations, while 57 percent work in the two lowest paying
groups. The percentage of workers in high-wage occupations is
slightly higher in Rochester and Albany than in the nation, with
the employment share of the mid-high-wage group in Albany
exceeding the share of the same group in the nation by more than
two percentage points. Accordingly, the employment shares of
the mid- and low-wage occupation groups are slightly lower in
the Rochester and the Albany metro areas than in the nation as
a whole. The percentage of workers in high-wage occupations
is slightly smaller in Buffalo and Syracuse than in the nation,
and significantly smaller in Utica. And Syracuse, Utica, and
Binghamton all have slightly higher shares of the two lowest
paying groups.

While the 2000 census gives a current snapshot of the occupational
landscape, we show how this landscape has changed by comparing
data from the 1990 and 2000 censuses. Using comparability tables
created by the U.S. Bureau of the Census to adjust for differences
between the SOC occupation categories used in 1990 and those
used in 2000,4 we find that education, healthcare, and community
and social services—areas of specialization upstate—are among
the fastest growing occupations, both nationally and regionally
(Table 3). Education and training occupations achieved a rate of
expansion in Buffalo and Syracuse that exceeded the nation’s
already rapid rate. These occupations expanded somewhat more
slowly in Rochester, Albany, and Utica than in the nation, and
much more slowly in Binghamton. The highly paid healthcare
practitioners occupation was the fastest growing occupation in
Buffalo, and grew considerably faster in Buffalo and Utica than
in the nation, but grew more slowly in remaining upstate areas
and shrank in Binghamton. The relatively low-paying healthcare
support occupation group was a top growth occupation upstate,

4

Buffalo Branch - FRBNY

THE REGIONAL ECONOMY
Table 4

Percentage Point Change in Share of Employment by Occupation Group: 1990 - 2000
SOC Wage Aggregation
U.S. Buffalo Rochester Albany Syracuse Utica Binghamton
High wage (> $50,000)

2.0

1.0

2.7

1.8

0.3

-0.9

1.4

Mid-high wage ($40,000 - $50,000)

1.0

2.2

0.7

2.0

0.8

2.0

-0.8

1.2

-0.2

-0.6

1.3

1.1

0.2

-1.3

-2.9
-1.0

-1.3
-1.5

-2.6
-0.1

-4.0
-0.9

-2.1
-0.1

-1.1
-0.2

0.1
0.7

Mid wage ($30,000 - $40,000)
Mid-low wage ($20,000 - $30,000)
Low wage (< $20,000)

Sources: U.S. Bureau of the Census, Summary File 3 (2000); U.S. Department of Labor, Occupational Employment Survey (2001).
Notes: The percentage point change in shares is calculated as the difference between the share of employment in the wage
category in 2000 and the share in 1990. Wage groups are based on the median U.S. wage and aggregated from the twenty-three
SOC occupation groups.

with a rate of expansion in all metro areas except Syracuse that
exceeded the nation’s. Community and social services work was
also among the region’s fastest growing occupations, outpacing
the national growth rate in Albany and Utica.

high-wage occupations, albeit at a slower pace. However, these
metro areas are losing employment in lower paying occupations
– something that the nation as a whole is not experiencing. Only
Rochester and Albany experienced significant growth in the
highest wage group; Buffalo and Binghamton saw small growth
in the highest wage group, while Syracuse and Utica experienced
a decline. The mid-high-wage group grew significantly and close
to the U.S. rate in Buffalo, Albany, and Utica, but grew much
more modestly in Rochester and Syracuse. Employment fell in
the two low-wage groups in every metro area, with the exception
of a small gain in Rochester’s lowest wage group.

By far, the most rapidly growing group nationwide is
computer and mathematical occupations, which more than
doubled in size between 1990 and 2000. A relatively highpaying occupation, it is a relatively small group, employing only
2.4 percent of the workforce. This occupation grew much more
slowly in Buffalo and Syracuse and shrank in Utica, but grew
close to the national rate in Rochester, Albany, and Binghamton.
Another small occupation that grew rapidly nationwide was legal
work. This highly paid occupation grew even faster in Albany
than in the nation, but it shrank in Rochester, Syracuse, Utica,
and Binghamton.

Coupling employment gains and losses with each occupation’s
employment shares, we find that the most significant causes of
job loss in upstate New York were contractions in office and
administrative support, construction, production, and retail and
sales occupations. The largest contributors to employment gains
were management, education, food preparation, and healthcare
occupations. Since job gains tended to be outweighed by losses,
employment in most upstate metros contracted between 1990
and 2000.

These growth patterns are altering the occupational structure
of the workforce. The change is reflected in the rise or decline
of the employment shares held by each of the five wage groups
between 1990 and 2000 (Table 4). Because higher wage groups are
growing more rapidly than lower wage groups in the United States,
the three highest wage occupation groups are gaining shares of
employment, while the remaining two low-wage groups are losing
shares. As a result of these developments, more of the country’s
workforce was employed in high-wage occupations in 2000 than
in 1990. The same redistribution of the workforce toward higher
wage occupations has occurred in much of upstate New York,
although the underlying developments have been somewhat
different: negative—not slow—growth in the lower wage groups,
paired with merely modest growth in the higher wage groups. In
Buffalo, Rochester, Albany, and Syracuse, the two high-wage
occupation groups are gaining shares of employment, while the
two lowest wage groups are losing shares. Utica and Binghamton,
however, exhibit somewhat different patterns: Utica is seeing an
increase in the employment share of mid-wage occupations and
a reduction in the shares at the upper and lower ends of the wage
spectrum. In Binghamton, the shares of the wage groups at the
upper and lower ends are growing, while the shares of the midwage and mid-high-wage groups are declining.

We also examined occupational changes across our five
wage groupings. The national pattern clearly indicates significant
growth in mid- and high-wage occupations, with little growth in
the lowest two wage groups. Upstate metro areas are undergoing
more significant and complex changes. With few exceptions,
upstate metro areas, like the nation, are experiencing growth in

While the United States experienced significant growth in
total employment during the 1990s, upstate New York experienced
very little. However, the pattern of employment growth and decline
across occupations, although different for the region than for the
nation, has had a similar impact on the shares of employment by
occupational wage groups.

Office and administrative support and retail and sales—the
two largest occupation groups, both relatively low-paying—are
growing very slowly nationwide and shrinking in all upstate
metro areas. Also losing ground both nationally and regionally
are production and farming occupations, as well as architecture
and engineering occupations. Other occupations that contracted
significantly in upstate New York were construction, arts, design
and entertainment, cleaning and maintenance, and the life,
physical, and social sciences occupations.

Buffalo Branch - FRBNY

5

THE REGIONAL ECONOMY
Conclusion
While job gains and losses in particular industries are in
important measure of structural change, shifts in the occupational
composition of an economy may be a better measure of underlying
workforce restructuring. Sluggish employment growth in upstate
New York during the 1990s was largely the result of a loss of
jobs in office and administrative support work, retail and sales,
construction, and production. These jobs tend to be on the lower
end of the wage spectrum. Upstate New York is gaining jobs in
healthcare, education, management, and food preparation. These
gains, however, have not been enough to offset employment
losses in other occupations for much of the region.
Our findings indicate that the structure of the upstate New
York workforce is indeed undergoing significant change. While
increases in mid- and high-wage occupations largely drove the
expansion of the nation’s employment base during the 1990s,
upstate New York experienced much more modest growth in these
occupations. Moreover, that modest growth was coupled with
a reduction in the number of workers in low-wage occupations.
Together, these forces produced a significant structural shift in the
labor force – a redistribution of employment that has increased the
share of jobs in high-paying occupations and decreased the share
of jobs in low-paying occupations. While the region’s economic

performance was well below the nation’s in the 1990s, economic
restructuring is creating a mix of occupations that, in terms of the
distribution of employment in the occupational wage structure,
resembles that of the nation.
Notes:
1
See “The Upstate Economy under the New NAICS Classification System,”
Regional Economy of Upstate New York, Federal Reserve Bank of New York,
Buffalo Branch, summer 2003.
2
See Office of Management and Budget, Standard Occupational
Classification Manual (Bernan Press, 2000).
3
This does not imply that the wage structure is equivalent, but that relative
shares of employment in wage categories roughly correspond.
4
These tables provide estimates of the proportion of employment from the
earlier SOC categories that fall into the new SOC categories
(see http://www.census.gov/hhes/www/sf3occcross_menu.html). These
estimates are, of course, inexact, and are only available at the national level.
Proportions are likely to differ among regions and applying them to local
areas introduces further inaccuracy. Nevertheless, this method of comparing
occupations between the two censuses is the only one currently available, and
it can provide a rough guide to regional occupational changes.

Richard Deitz

The views expressed in this newsletter are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the position of the Federal
Reserve Bank of New York or the Federal Reserve System.

Buffalo Branch
Federal Reserve Bank of New York
PO Box 961
Buffalo, NY 14240-0961

PRESORTED
STANDARD
U.S. POSTAGE
PAID
BUFFALO, NY
PERMIT NO. 1