Prolonged Sitting and Office Clerks, General

Last week, we discussed office clerks, general as a basis for the continued viability of Table 1 of the Medical-Vocational Guidelines.  A person under  the age of 50 and restricted to the full range of sedentary work without the presence of transferable skills has a directed decision of "not disabled."  Most of the production related occupations no longer exist in any significant numbers at the sedentary range.  General office clerks continue to represent about 605,000 unskilled sedentary jobs in the nation.  That is clearly a significant number of jobs.

For this exercise, we assume no cognitive, social limitations, or manipulative limitations in performing unskilled work.  The deficit we do assume is a medically-based limitation to six hours of sitting in an eight-hour day.

43-9061.00 Office Clerks, General

Series ID: ORUP1000075800000133

Not seasonally adjusted

Series Title: office clerks, general; hours of sitting (10th percentile)

Requirement: Physical Demands

Occupation: Office Clerks, General

Estimate: hours of sitting (10th percentile)

Year	Period	Estimate
2018	Annual	3.75

https://beta.bls.gov/dataViewer/view/timeseries/ORUP1000075800000133

Series ID: ORUP1000075800000134

Not seasonally adjusted

Series Title: office clerks, general; hours of sitting (25th percentile)

Requirement: Physical Demands

Occupation: Office Clerks, General

Estimate: hours of sitting (25th percentile)

Year	Period	Estimate
2018	Annual	5.25

https://beta.bls.gov/dataViewer/view/timeseries/ORUP1000075800000134

Series ID: ORUP1000075800000135

Not seasonally adjusted

Series Title: office clerks, general; hours of sitting (50th percentile - median)

Requirement: Physical Demands

Occupation: Office Clerks, General

Estimate: hours of sitting (50th percentile - median)

Year	Period	Estimate
2018	Annual	6.4

https://beta.bls.gov/dataViewer/view/timeseries/ORUP1000075800000135

Standing/walking more than occasionally disqualifies an occupation from classification as sedentary.  The 10th and 25th percentiles describe work that is not sedentary:

8 / 3 = 2.67

8 - 2.67 = 5.33

Sitting 5.25 hours per day is less than 5.33 hour per day. SSR 83-10 states as a matter of agency policy:

Even though the weight lifted in a particular light job may be very little, a job is in this category when it requires a good deal of walking or standing -- the primary difference between sedentary and most light jobs.

This observation fits with the classification of 73.3% of general office clerks as requiring sedentary exertion.  The 25th percentile cannot represent sedentary work.  

Series ID: ORUP1000075800000661

Not seasonally adjusted

Series Title: % of office clerks, general; strength is sedentary

Requirement: Physical Demands

Occupation: Office Clerks, General

Estimate: strength is sedentary

Year	Period	Estimate
2018	Annual	73.3

https://beta.bls.gov/dataViewer/view/timeseries/ORUP1000075800000661

Sedentary work starts at about the 26.7 percentile.  Now we make some assumptions about the line between the 25th percentile and the 50th percentile.  Assume that the line is straight.  The difference between 6.4 and 5.25 is 1.15 hours of sitting in a day.  We account for 25 percentile increase, so divide 1.15 by 25.  That gives us 0.046 hours increase in the amount of sitting per percentile point increase.  Moving to the 26.7th percentile (a 1.7 percentile increase) yields 0.0782 hours.  Adding 5.25 to 0.0782 equals 5.3282.  Round that up and we get 5.33 hours, the absolute minimum for sedentary classification.  

What we really need to know is where the work crosses that 6 hour line.  This is a 0.75 increase from the 25th percentile.  

0.75 / 0.046 = 16.30345

The 6 hour mark is at the 41.3 percentile.  Stated differently, 41.3% of general office clerks sit 6 hours per day or less.  Of those general office clerks that do not sit more than 6 hours, most of the require more than sedentary exertion.  That leaves 15% of general office clerks that engage in sedentary exertion and sit 6 hours per day or less.  

Last week, we calculated that general office clerks engaged in unskilled work in 825,860 jobs.  If 15% of unskilled work is sedentary, then the number of sedentary unskilled general office clerks that sit 6 hours per day or less is 123,879 jobs.  

That calculation rests on the assumption that the person can both sit up to 6 hours and stand/walk up to 2.67 hours.  If the person can stand/walk 2 hours in a day, that person can perform jobs at the 41.3 percentile mark and no others.  Without the flexibility to stand/walk the full range of occasionally, a worker that cannot sit more than 6 hours is limited to 8,259 jobs. 

See When to Use Occu Collect.