The Harris Poll^® #57, October 1, 2003

Scientists, Firemen, Doctors, Teachers and Nurses Top List as "Most Prestigious Occupations"

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Americans see scientists, firemen, doctors, teachers and nurses as the professions and occupations which have the most prestige. At the other end of the spectrum, the occupations which are seen as having the least prestige are real estate agents, stockbrokers, actors, bankers and accountants.

Only three occupations are perceived to have "very great" prestige by more than half of all adults; these are scientists (57%), firemen (55%) and doctors (52%). They are followed by four professions which are perceived to have "very great" prestige by more than 40% but less than 50% - teachers (49%), nurses (47%), military officers (46%) and police officers (42%).

By way of contrast, the list includes ten occupations which are perceived by less than 20% to have "very great" prestige. The lowest ratings go to real estate agents (6%), stockbrokers (8%), actors (13%), bankers (14%), accountants (15%) and union leaders (15%).

These are some of the results of the annual Harris Poll measuring public perceptions of 22 professions and occupations, conducted by telephone between August 12 and 17, 2003, with a sample of 1,011 adults.

There is not much of a correlation between making money and having high prestige. Firemen, teachers, nurses and police officers all score very well on prestige but are not particularly well compensated. At the other end of the spectrum, real estate agents, stockbrokers, actors, bankers and accountants can often make substantial sums of money, but have little prestige.

It is also clear that prestige does not mean celebrity. Most celebrities are probably actors, entertainers or athletes; and all of these are in the bottom half of the list in terms of prestige.

To judge from these data, it seems that prestige is strongly associated with respect. Professions with high prestige are those which are widely seen to do great work which benefits society and the people they serve.

Harris Interactive has been asking about the prestige of different professions and occupations since 1977. Over the 26 years since then there have been some quite substantial changes:

• Those who see teachers as having "very great" prestige have risen 20 points from 29% to 49%.
  
• Those who think lawyers have "very great" prestige have fallen 19 points, from 36% to 17%.
  
• Scientists have fallen nine points from 66% to 57%.
  
• Doctors have also fallen nine points from 61% to 52%.
  
• Athletes have also fallen nine points from 26% to 17%.

With the exception of teachers, no occupation or profession on the list has improved its ratings since 1977.

Most of the changes since last year are relatively small, within a possible sampling error for this survey. The biggest change is for scientists who improved their "very great" prestige score by six points, from 51% to 57%.

Humphrey Taylor is the chairman of The Harris Poll^®, Harris Interactive.

"I am going to read off a number of different occupations. For each, would you tell me if you feel it is an occupation of very great prestige, considerable prestige, some prestige or hardly any prestige at all?"

Base: All Adults

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** Questions contain reference to "man" in these profession titles reflecting how they were originally asked. They remain the same in order not to disrupt the trending of the data related to these professions.

"I am going to read off a number of different occupations. For each, would you tell me if you feel it is an occupation of very great prestige, considerable prestige, some prestige or hardly any prestige at all?"

Base: All Adults

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* No trend; NA not asked

** In earlier surveys we used the words "policeman" (now changed to "police officer") and businessman (now changed to "business executive") which may account for the changes from 2001 to 2002.

The Harris Poll^® was conducted by telephone within the United States between August 12 and 17, 2003 among a nationwide cross section of 1,011 adults (ages 18+). Figures for age, sex, race, education, number of adults and number of voice/telephone lines in the household were weighted where necessary to align them with their actual proportions in the population.

In theory, with a probability sample of this size, one can say with 95 percent certainty that the results have a statistical precision of plus or minus 3 percentage points of what they would be if the entire adult population had been polled with complete accuracy. Unfortunately, there are several other possible sources of error in all polls or surveys that are probably more serious than theoretical calculations of sampling error. They include refusals to be interviewed (non-response), question wording and question order, interviewer bias, weighting by demographic control data and screening (e.g., for likely voters). It is impossible to quantify the errors that may result from these factors.

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