O*NET OnLine Will Migrate to the SOC 2018 in November 2020

New O*NET-SOC Taxonomy Transition Tools within O*NET Web Services

With the release of the O*NET 25.1 Database in November 2020, O*NET Web Services will transition to the O*NET-SOC 2019 taxonomy. This taxonomy, based on the 2018 SOC, introduces several changes to the occupations returned by our services. It includes 1,016 occupational titles, 923 of which represent O*NET data-level occupations. For more information on these changes, see the O*NET-SOC Taxonomy page at the O*NET Resource Center.

To help O*NET Web Services users with the upcoming taxonomy transition, Taxonomy Services are now available to enable developers to connect occupational data between existing systems based on the O*NET-SOC 2010 taxonomy, and the future O*NET-SOC 2019 taxonomy-based O*NET Web Services.

That's the announcement from the Department of Labor, Employment Training Administration (ETA). One big change comes in production workers, all other (51-9199).  This probably the most statistically abused group in terms of the number of DOT codes (1,590), the number of unskilled sedentary and light DOT codes (457), and the insidious use of equal distribution.  Part of that will go away in November.  Here is what is happening to SOC 51-9199 and its detailed occupation 51-9199.01 Recycling and Reclamation Workers:

51-9161.00 Computer Numerically Controlled Tool Operators
51-9162.00 Computer Numerically Controlled Tool Programmers
51-9199.00 Production Workers, All Other
53-7062.04 Recycling and Reclamation Workers

Some DOT codes, maybe, and a significant number of jobs will move to other O*NET/SOC codes.  Part of the gross data aggregation will go away.  Production workers, all other will get numerically smaller.  None of the unskilled sedentary and light DOT codes currently resident in production workers, all other fit the three new classifications.

Another statistical mess will get cleaned up.  Stock clerks and order fillers will consolidate four detailed occupations back into the single SOC code:

43-5081.01 Stock Clerks, Sales Floor
43-5081.02 Marking Clerks
43-5081.03 Stock Clerks- Stockroom, Warehouse, or Storage Yard
43-5081.04 Order Fillers, Wholesale and Retail Sales

Those four detailed occupations and the constituent 2 million jobs will all end up in Stockers and Order Fillers with a new numerical designation, but same name:

53-7065.00 Stockers and Order Fillers

We can expect the ORS will track the new changes.  Counting unskilled light stockers and order fillers will get easier because the data will designate light and unskilled jobs.  We will still have to put the numbers together.  My suspicion is that the number of light markers will go down significantly because the range of medium exertion includes constant lifting/carrying of 2 pounds or frequent lifting/carrying of 11 pounds in addition to the recognized occasional lifting/carrying of 21 pounds all to that maximum of seldom lifting/carrying of 50 pounds.

When the data arrives, you can expect to see it incorporated into OccuCollect and its heralded everything report.

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SUGGESTED CITATION:

Lawrence Rohlfing, O*NET OnLine Will Migrate to the SOC 2018 in November 2020, California Social Security Attorney (April 2, 2020)
https://californiasocialsecurityattorney.blogspot.com/2020/04/onet-online-will-migrate-to-soc-2018-in.html