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Appendix: Occupational Rankings This study trisects Philadelphia’s white-collar workforce into professional, proprietary ,and clerical (office and sales) segments.Any scholar relying on census material encounters some highly interpretable occupational designations. Workers counted as professional in this study had clear professional or managerial components to their work experiences. Foremen, forewomen, overseers, and floorwalkers all had heavy managerial responsibilities and thus are grouped with professionals. Bankers , commercial brokers, stockbrokers, and commission men do not fit under the clerical category, because they had higher status and pay than typical clerks and salespeople. The degree to which they were independent was also unclear, so they do not readily fit in the proprietary segment—hence their listing as professionals. People with occupations listed in the proprietary category basically ran independent businesses.Hucksters and peddlers are listed under the proprietary category because of their independence. Photographers are also grouped here, because, more often than not, they operated their own studios. Likewise, real estate agents often ran their own offices and are listed as proprietary for this study. Office or sales workers were those who held nonprofessional positions as “information workers” essential to the industrial-era office or selling floor.Accountants represent a special case.In the study they are considered clerical workers from 1870 to 1910,because their field was not fully professionalized in that period.For 1920 they are considered professional.Office and bundle boys are counted as office employees, because these positions were viewed by bosses and workers as the lowest rungs on the ladder into the clerical and indeed, white-collar realms.Insurance agents most often worked for large insurance firms in Philadelphia and thus are categorized as clerical workers. A handful of mail carriers appear in the 1920 census figures in this study.Their jobs dealt with information and were not simply blue-collar in nature. They also do not easily fit the proprietary or professional categories.All men, they made up less than 1 percent of the total clerical employees counted for that year. 164 Appendix Occupational Rankings Professional Proprietary Clerical Banker Boardinghouse owner Accountant Buyer Dealer Agent Chemist Hosteler Bookkeeper Clergy Hotelkeeper Bundle boy Commercial broker Huckster Canvasser Commission man Lodging-house owner Cashier Dentist Manufacturer Clerk Designer Merchant Collector Draftsman Peddler Copyist Druggist Photographer Insurance agent Engineer— Real estate agent Mail carrier Civil Restaurant owner Messenger Electrical Retail dealer Office boy Mechanical Saloonkeeper Sales agent Floorwalker Small-business owner Salesperson Foreman Trader Stenographer Forewoman Undertaker Telegrapher Government official Wholesale dealer Telephone operator Inspector Traveler Typewriter Insurance co. official Intellectual Journalist Lawyer Manufacturing official Nurse Official Overseer Physician Stockbroker Superintendent Surgeon Teacher Veterinarian ...

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