The National Committee of Vital Health Statistics (NCVHS) is recommending that occupation and industry are added to the list of key measures that the the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services uses to assess socioeconomic status in its surveys.

That action is backed by National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH) researchers, who say; “cccupation and industry are core socioeconomic variables collected in most federal health surveys. Relevant distinctions in occupation are not detected by other indicators of SES.”