Intergenerational Occupational Mobility in a Rural Area

Personal interviews with an area-probability sample of households in the Ru segments of subUr Prince George & Montgomery Counties, Md, provide data on occup of 1,930 household heads, & their fathers at about the same period of their careers. Intergenerational occup'al shifts into & out of agriculture are analyzed, & some long-run soc changes indicated. Chi-square analysis showed occup'al distributions of fathers & sons were not independent (Chi-square=932.98: p0.001). Occup's were classified into 4 broad categories: (1) white collar workers (WCW's), (2) farm operator (FO), (3) skilled & semi-skilled (SSS), & (4) laborer (L). Major diff's were lower %'s of FO's & higher %'s of WCW's among sons, than among fathers. There were 71% of sons of WCW's, 70% of sons of L's, 47% of sons of SSS, & 22% of sons of FO's in the same category as that of their fathers. About 50% of the sons of FO's failed to attain an occup'al level equal to that of their fathers, about 30% were upwardly mobile. The % of FO's in the sample decreased 73% between the 2 generations; the % of WCW's nearly doubled. FO residents averaged 10 yrs older than nonFO residents & 80% had lived in the area 20 or more yrs, indicating limited entrance into the farming occup. Predominant land-use pattern appears little changed by Ur encroachment, but marked intergenerational occup'al changes reflect less apparent soc changes. AA.