Agreement of latest and longest occupation and industry as reported in the 1980 National Health Interview Survey.

The effectiveness of using the latest occupation instead of usual in studies of chronic disease was assessed by comparing latest and usual occupation for agreement. The 1980 National Health Interview Survey Occupational Supplement collected information on both latest and longest job and the lengths of the jobs. We compared the latest occupation and industry with the longest (usual) occupation and industry for agreement. For men, the industry agreement was 68.1% and the occupation agreement was 69.9%. Women had slightly higher agreement: 70.3% for industry and 70.5% for occupation. The percent of agreement varied by industry or occupation and age, sex, race, respondent, and length of latest job. We conclude that the percentage of agreement of latest occupation and industry with usual is sufficient for analyses of National Health Interview Survey chronic disease data using latest occupation or industry.