Status Among Clerical Workers

Students of industrial organization have long been interested in the connection between the relative status of workers on different jobs and the characteristics of these jobs, especially differences in pay. But surprisingly few studies of this connection have been reported in any detail. In this paper, I shall describe how a group of workers complained because the high status conferred on them by some features of their job was not reflected in other features. By the status of a job I shall mean the rank assigned to the job by the workers, in so far as it is better or worse than other jobs and according to the degree they feel it realizes certain values or norms.