Detailed Category Descriptions and Operational Issues1

Class 1: Large employers, higher grade professional, administrative and managerial occupations: ‘the higher salariat’

Large employers: large employers are allocated to Class 1 on the assumption that their businesses involve a similar degree and exercise of managerial authority to that of higher managers. In this sense, they are seen as different from small employers in Classes 4 and 5.

A size rule of +/-10 employees is used to distinguish large from small employers.

Higher grade professional occupations: These occupations are regulated through a service relationship. Examples of professional occupations which would be typical of Class 1 are ISCO Occupational Unit Groups (OUGs) 2421 lawyers, 2111-22 scientists, 2310 higher education teaching professionals and 2142-7 professional engineers.

On the grounds that ‘a professional is a professional is a professional’, the self-employed and small employer professionals are allocated to the same class as employees in their profession. That is, we regard professional status as paramount. Professional self-employment is different in nature from non-professional self-employment. Professionals who are self-employed generally have more control over their market situations than non-professionals. They also share more in common with employed professionals than with self-employed non-professionals.

Higher grade administrative and managerial occupations<.i>: again regulated via a service relationship, the most typical occupations in this part of Class 1 are Chief Executive Officers and the most senior levels of the civil service or state bureaucracies. Company directors and chief executives are identified by ISCO 1210, higher level government officials by 1110. For other managerial OUGs it is much more difficult operationally to distinguish higher from lower grade managerial and administrative occupations. However, minor group 123 is more likely to have a preponderance of higher grade managers, e.g. 1231 finance managers.