General Office Clerks -- Broken Down by Skill and Exertion with the OOH, ORS, and O*NET

Office Clerks, General (SOC 43-9061) is a huge occupational group -- in terms of the number of jobs.  The Occupational Outlook Handbook describes the group:

43-9061 Office clerks, general

Typical Education Needed	High school diploma or equivalent
Work Experience in a Related Occupation	None
Typical On-The-Job Training Needed to Attain Competency	Short-term on-the-job training
2016 Employment	3,117,700

The need for a high school or equivalent education fits with understanding of the nature of clerical work. The education level of incumbents reported by the Employment Projections illustrates the typicality of reports from the OOH:

Education Levels of Incumbents

43-9061 Office clerks, general

Typical Education Needed	High school diploma or equivalent
Less than a High School Education	3.4
High School Education or Equivalent	28.8
Some College, No Degree	31.6
Associates Degree	13.1
Bachelor's Degree	18.7
Masters's Degree	3.4
Doctoral or Professional Degree	0.8

The report of a high school education represents a rough average of less than a high school education, high school education or equivalent, and some college but no degree. This report categorizes education level of incumbents, not necessarily job requirements. The observation that a significant portion of the occupational base has a high school education or equivalent fits with the classification of a typical need for a high school education or equivalent.

The presence of short-term on-the-job training translates to unskilled work.  The OOH glossary defines short-term on-the-job training as:

1 month or less of combined on-the-job experience and informal training that is needed for the worker to develop skills to attain competency in the occupation, this on-the-job training category also includes employer-sponsored training programs.

The presence of an occupational base of 3.1 million jobs requiring a high school education or equivalent and typically unskilled creates a clear basis for a conclusion that a lot of those jobs exists. But we need to focus on not the typical way in which the job is performed but the way in which the jobs are actually performed across the economy. For that we turn to the Occupational Requirements Survey.

43-9061 Office clerks, general

SVP Calculations
SVP	Value	Jobs	Calculation
SVP 1	5.8%	3,117,700	180,827
SVP 2	29.5%	3,117,700	919,722
SVP 3	7.2%	3,117,700	224,474
SVP 4	7.6%	3,117,700	236,945
SVP 5	8.6%	3,117,700	268,122
SVP 6	19.5%	3,117,700	607,952
SVP 7	18.1%	3,117,700	564,304

By looking at the specific vocational preparation time as set forth in the ORS, we find that the largest single concentration of jobs is at SVP 2 but the unskilled variety of work still represents less than a third of the total jobs within the classification. Over a million jobs still leaves a lot of work to do in terms of understanding the availability of unskilled work in the economy. The ORS provides detailed information about exertion within the occupational base.

Strength Calculations
Strength Type	Value	Jobs	Calculation
Sedentary	32.8%	3,117,700	1,022,606
Light Work	41%	3,117,700	1,278,257
Medium Work	25.1%	3,117,700	782,543

Sedentary work represents almost a third of the jobs and light work representing over 40 percent of the jobs that all skill levels. One other piece of data is critical for understanding the existence of work that amounts to substantial gainful activity, whether the work is full-time or part-time,  For that information, we turn to the O*NET OnLine:

43-9061.00 - Office clerks, general

Duration of Typical Work Week — Number of hours typically worked in one week.	26	Less Than 40 Hours
	15	40 Hours
	59	More Than 40 Hours

Slightly more than a quarter of the jobs are not full-time work and therefore do not presumptively represent substantial gainful activity. Since we are looking for the existence of unskilled work that exists in the national economy and represents presumptive substantial gainful activity, we can synthesize these three data reports:

2016 Employment	% Unskilled	# Unskilled
3,117,700	35.30%	1,100,548
# Unskilled	% Full-Time	# Full-Time
1,100,548	74%	814,406
# Full-Time	% Sedentary	# Sedentary
814,406	32.80%	267,125
# Full-Time	% Light	# Light
814,406	41%	333,906
# Full-Time	% Medium	# Medium
814,406	25.10%	204,416

From this data, it is now possible to examine the impact of exertional limitations on sitting (the median requires more than six hours per day of sitting), the sit stand option at will (79.9% of jobs permit sitting versus standing/walking at will), and limited standing (90% of jobs do not require standing/walking more than 50% of the day).  The ORS provides a basis for reducing the number of jobs available based on reaching overhead (47.7% with most of those bilaterally); frequent gross manipulation ( 19.9%); frequent fine manipulation (6.9%); or frequent reaching at or below shoulder level (16.2%).  

The most fertile ground for reducing the number of jobs available is based on the social requirements of work. General office clerks require coordinating with regular contacts (62.8% of jobs) or gentle persuading (6%). Those limitations would preclude jobs for an individual limited to simple contact with coworkers and supervisors. General office clerks have continuous contact with "other contacts" (10.1%); more than once per hour (27.3%); and more than once per day (30.7%).  

Other limitations could also significantly impact the number of jobs available for an individual limited to sedentary, light, or medium work where relevant. The limitations in sitting, standing, walking, manipulation, or social contact are provided here as examples of data available in the ORS and OccuCollect.com.