A new socioeconomic index for Australia

This article provides an overview of the development of a new occupational status scale, the Australian Socioeconomic Index 2006 (AUSEI06). This is the latest in the series of ANU scales, which since 1965 have provided a means for researchers to convert data coded in accordance with official occupational classifications into occupational status scores. The ANU scales have been widely used in fields such as sociology, education, economics and health. The new scale has been developed in response to the introduction of the Australian and New Zealand Standard Classification of Occupations (ANZSCO) by the Australian Bureau of Statistics. Recent changes in the structure of the labour market are taken into account through the use of 2006 Australian Census data for scale development. In addition, the naming convention of the scale has been revised in order to better reflect its nature: the Australian (AU) Socioeconomic Index (SEI) 2006(06) or AUSEI06.