Electrical and Electronic Equipment Assemblers -- Post Biestek Analysis -- Part 1

We are in the post-Biestek era.  The record must show conflict.  That poses the obligation on the ALJ to resolve that conflict.  Unrebutted testimony is substantial evidence.  Today, we start the process of understanding Electrical and Electronic Equipment Assemblers (SOC 51-2022) (equipment assemblers).  In this piece, we survey the Dictionary of Occupational Titles, Occupational Outlook Handbook, Occupational Employment Quarterly, and Job Browser Pro.

We start this process with the survey of the DOT. Equipment assemblers contains 61 DOT codes.

Sedentary: 3 occupations, 1 unskilled
Light: 39 occupations, 10 unskilled
Medium: 16 occupations, 1 unskilled
Heavy: 3 occupations, 0 unskilled

Still looking for the broad overview, we turn to the Occupational Outlook Handbook.  The OccuCollect OOH report states:

51-2022 Electrical and electronic equipment assemblers

Typical Education Needed,	High school diploma or equivalent
Work Experience in a Related Occupation	None
Typical On-The-Job Training Needed to Attain Competency	Moderate-term on-the-job training
2016 Employment	218,900

The typical requirements are a high school or equivalent education, no prior work experience, and are either semi-skilled or skilled.  Equipment assemblers represent 218,900 jobs.  Most of them require education and training that precludes identification by a vocational expert as target work at step 5 of the sequential evaluation process.  .

A gross equal distribution method would lead a vocational expert to identify 3,600 sedentary jobs and 35,900 light jobs.  The equal distribution method crumbles with cross-examination and the submission of rebuttal evidence.  

The Occupational Employment Quarterly (version 3.1 4th quarter 2018) uses a different data set for job numbers and reports 3,054 sedentary unskilled jobs and 30,541 light unskilled jobs.  

Job Browser Pro (version 1.67, 2017 job estimates) estimates about 1,600 jobs as a sedentary unskilled stem mounter.  JBP estimates about 78,000 jobs as light unskilled equipment assemblers.  JBP's analysis puts over half of these jobs as a record-changer assembler (DOT 720.687-010).  

Two sources suggest that some analysis of equipment assemblers will lead to a significant number of jobs in the light range of exertion and a piece at the sedentary range of exertion.  The problem rests on the gross equal distribution used by the OEQ and the sub-industry use of equal distribution by JBP.  We examine the Bureau of Labor Statistics in our next piece. 

See When to Use Occu Collect.