Opportunity and Attainment in Australia Leonard Broom F
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in Australia Opportunity and attainmentand ^ Leonard Broom Opportunity K. Lancaster »Jones and attainment in Australia Leonard Broom Lancaster Jor Australia is often referred to as a classless society, with few of the class distinctions of the old world, but this description has never been tested systematically. More radical writers now assert that there is a rigid class structure and much special privilege. They maintain that there is little opportunity for persons to advance materially by their own efforts. This book attempts to provide an answer to these conflicting claims. It examines how far equality of opportunity exists, in the educational system and elsewhere. It describes the long-term trend in the distribution of wealth and income and estimates how far Australian society is stratified compared with other countries. These and related questions are examined systematically by means of the results of a national sample survey conducted by the authors in 1965 and by comparison with other evidence relating to education, employment and income. The authors’ main conclusion is that, while Australian society is clearly stratified in each generation, high rates of mobility limit significantly the extent to which inequality is transmitted within the family from one generation to the next. Though primarily intended for use in senior undergraduate and graduate courses in the social sciences there is much to interest readers concerned with con temporary Australian society in particular and advanced industrial countries generally. This book was published by ANU Press between 1965–1991. This republication is part of the digitisation project being carried out by Scholarly Information Services/Library and ANU Press. This project aims to make past scholarly works published by The Australian National University available to a global audience under its open-access policy. Opportunity and attainment in Australia Leonard Broom F. Lancaster Jones with the collaboration of Jerzy Zubrzycki Opportunity and attainment in Australia Australian National University Press Canberra 1976 First published in Australia 1976 Printed in Hong Kong for the Australian National University Press, Canberra © Leonard Broom and F. Lancaster Jones 1976 This book is copyright. Apart from any fair dealing for the purpose of private study, research, criticism, or review, as permitted under the Copyright Act, no part may be reproduced by any process without written permission. Inquiries should be made to the publisher. National Library of Australia Cataloguing-in-Publication entry Broom, Leonard. Opportunity and attainment in Australia. Bibliography. Index. ISBN 0 7081 1041 x. 1. Social mobility — Australia. 2. Australia — Social conditions. I. Jones, Frank Lancaster, joint author. II. Zubrzycki, Jerzy, joint author. III. Title. 301.440440994 Preface The survey (ANU 1965) which is the We are grateful to Professor D.A. primary source for this monograph was Aitkin and the Department of Political financed by the Research School of Social Science in the Research School of Social Sciences, Australian National University. Sciences for access to the findings of their We acknowledge the co-operation of Mr 1967 survey. Roy Morgan, Director of the Roy Morgan Mrs Betty Gamble prepared the manu Research Centre, whose field staff con script and Mrs Gretchan Broom marked it ducted most of the interviews. Professor for the press. When their contributions John Nalson kindly supervised the acqui were not redactive they were auctorial. sition of a rural supplementary sample in Mrs Judy Dillon capably read proof and Western Australia under difficult circum prepared the index. stances and we appreciate his generous We thank them for their contributions. assistance. This monograph draws upon earlier We thank the Australian Statistician publications, listed in the references, in for preparing tabulations from the 1969 which we reported specialised findings survey of incomes and for making available from the survey and related research. We unpublished tabulations from the 1966 express our appreciation to the editors of census. those publications. Planning for the study was helped by a fellowship to the first author at the Center L.B. and F.L.J. for Advanced Study in the Behavioral Canberra 1975 Sciences. The collegial hospitality of the Center and of Dr Ralph W. Tyler are gratefully acknowledged. Institutional support for analysis was extended in the form of visiting appoint ments by the ANU to Broom and by the University of Texas to Jones. We express thanks to Professor P.H. Partridge and Professor W.D. Borrie of the Research School of Social Sciences, Australian National University and to Dean Gordon Whaley of the University of Texas. Professor J. Zubrzycki took an active part in the study design, project admi nistration and early analysis. Other claims on his time made it impossible for him to participate in the final analysis and writing but his significant role is indicated on the title page. Contents Preface v Tables ix 1 Introduction 1 2 Education, Social Origins, and Achievement 7 3 Occupational Structure and Occupational Change 28 4 Wealth and Income 42 5 Class 60 6 Mobility and the Process of Occupational Achievement 85 7 Social Strata: Stability and Change 106 Appendix 1 121 Appendix 2 133 References 142 Index 151 Tables 2.1 Educational attainment of adult 3.2 Occupation distribution of the work males and females, 1966 (column force, 1911 to 1966 (percentages) 35 percentages) 11 3.3 Occupational distribution of male 2.2 Education needed for a young man workers, 1911 to 1966 (percen or woman to get along in Australia tages) 36 today, by education of male respon 3.4 Occupational distribution of the dent (row percentages) 14 female workforce, 1911 to 1966 2.3 Education needed for a young man (percentages) 38 or woman to get along in Australia 3.5 Women as a percentage of the total today, by education of female workforce in different occupational respondent (row percentages) 15 groups, 1911 to 1966 39 2.4 Educational homo gamy (row per 4.1 Social security expenditures as a centages) 16 percentage of gross national product 2.5 Educational homogamy (column per and by origin of receipts, 1965-6 or centages) 17 1966 44 2.6 Educational origins of spouses (row 4.2 Number and value of estates of percentages) 18 deceased males in Victoria, 1915 and 2.7 Educational origins of spouses 1965 (in cumulative percentages) 48 (column percentages) 18 4.3 Median income of full-year, full-time 2.8 Educational homogamy for selected male and female workers in relation marriage cohorts, 1966 (row per to educational attainment and age, centages) 20 1968-69 55 2.9 Educational homogamy for selected 4.4 Estimated life-time earnings of full- marriage cohorts, 1966 (column year, full-time workers by education, percentages) 22 1968-69 56 2.10 Percentage upwardly mobile by 4.5 Median dollar incomes of male and amount and type of education 24 female full-year, full-time workers in 2.11 Relationship between education and selected occupations, 1968-69 57-8 occupation of the male workforce, 5.1 Class schemes 61 1966 (row percentages) 25 5.2 Opinions about the existence of 2.12 Relationship between education and social classes (column percen occupation of the male workforce, tages) 63 1965 (row percentages) 26 3.1 A functional classification of the 5.3 Self-identified class (column per Australian population, 1911, 1933, centages) 64 1947 and 1966 30 5.4 Working-class identification of respondents and their parents 6.5 Career mobility in the United States classified by occupation, 1967 66 (1962) 94 5.5 Views about middle-class people, 6.6 Structural change and patterns of classified by occupation and self- career mobility in Australia (1965) identified class of respondents and the U.S.A. (1962) 95 (column percentages) 67 6.7 Simple correlations among six status 5.6 Views about working-class people, characteristics in Australia (1965)100 classified by occupation and self- 6.8 Path coefficients in the process of identified class of respondents achievement in Australia (1965) 101 (column percentages) 69 7.1 Social characteristics of ten strata, 5.7 Class origins, class placement, and 1965 (row percentages) 109 class of friends (row percentages) 71 7.2 Average status levels and status 5.8 Class origins, class placement, and class of neighbours (row per consistency of ten strata 111 centages) 73 7.3 Stratum consistency and class self- identification, 1965 (row percen 5.9 Class solidarity and class-related tages) 115 attitudes 74 7.4 Father-to-son mobility in ten social 5.10 The educational basis for self- strata, 1965 117 identified class (row percentages) 78 7.5 Stratum consistency in terms of 5.11 The occupational basis of self- social origins (1865) (column per identified class (row percentages) 79 centages) 118 5.12 The income basis of self-identified A2.1 Geographical distributions .in the class (row percentages) 80 1965 survey and the 1966 census 5.13 Four measures of social rank, 1965 (column percentages) 134 and 1967 80 A2.2 Age distributions in the 1965 survey 5.14 Relationship between self-identified and 1966 census (column percen class and selected characteristics 81 tages) 134 5.15 Relative importance of selected A2.3 Occupational distributions in the characteristics in predicting class 1965 survey and the 1966 census self-identification 83 (column percentages) 135 6.1 Father-to-son mobility in Australia A2.4 Birthplace distributions in the 1965 (1965) 87 survey and the 1966 census 135 6.2 Father-to-son mobility in the United Figure States(1962) 88 6.3 Structural change and patterns of 6.1 Process model of occupational father-to-son mobility in Australia achievement in Australia, 1965 99 (1965) and the U.S.A. (1962) 90 6.4 Career mobility in Australia (1965) 93 1 Introduction This book sets out to portray the patterns tegrate a wider range of sources.