# Sociologists

US SOC code 19-3041. Markdown version of https://futurehistory.earth/timeline/19-3041

Also called: Research sociologist, Applied sociologist, Quantitative sociologist, Qualitative sociologist, Computational sociologist.

## In brief

In May 2025, [BLS](https://www.bls.gov/oes/special-requests/oesm25nat.zip) counted **2,260** US sociologists, with median pay of **$106,030** a year. Of the BLS counts since 2003, the highest was **4,430**, in May 2009. The earliest figure here is [an estimate](https://eric.ed.gov/?id=ED230462) of **1,200** from 1930, not measured the same way as today's count. The last full technology era for sociologists: Computational social science, 2010 to 2023. Computational methods bifurcated the profession between researchers who could code and those who could not.

## What the sources say

### Official outlook

BLS projects employment to grow 3.8% from 2025 to 2035. Source: [BLS Employment Projections 2025-35](https://data.bls.gov/projections/nationalMatrix?queryParams=19-3041&ioType=o).

### AI exposure studies

- **61.5%** of this job's tasks are exposed to large language models. Not a forecast of job losses. [Eloundou and others, 2023](https://github.com/openai/GPTs-are-GPTs/blob/main/data/occ_level.csv)

Data as of BLS OEWS May 2025; BLS Employment Projections 2025-35. BLS publishes these counts as yearly survey snapshots and cautions against reading them as a precise trend. In May 2021 BLS changed how it estimates these counts (a model-based method using three years of survey data) and moved fully to the 2018 occupation codes, so part of a change across 2021 can come from the method rather than the work.

## Sociologists employment and pay by year

- On record since: 1892
- Latest US employment: 2,260 (May 2025). Source: BLS OEWS May 2025 [5]
- Latest US median pay: $106,030 (May 2025). Source: BLS OEWS May 2025 [8]
- Outlook: +3.8% by 2035. Source: BLS Employment Projections 2025-35 [22]

### All 29 years of cited US data

| Year | US employment | Annual pay (median unless marked) | Source |
| --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1930 | 1,200 (estimate) | n/a | Est., ERIC ED230462 [1] |
| 1960 | 6,500 (estimate) | n/a | Est., American Sociological Association [2] |
| 1970 | n/a | $12,000 (estimate) | Est., AAUP Faculty Compensation Survey [6] |
| 1975 | 16,000 (estimate) | n/a | Est., University of Minnesota [3] |
| 1990 | n/a | $36,000 (estimate) | Est., AAUP Faculty Compensation Survey [6] |
| 2000 | 1,360 | $45,670 | BLS OEWS 2000 [4] |
| 2003 | 3,060 | $54,410 | BLS OEWS May 2003 [5] |
| 2004 | 3,640 | $57,870 | BLS OEWS May 2004 [5] |
| 2005 | 3,500 | $52,760 | BLS OEWS May 2005 [5] |
| 2006 | 3,440 | $60,290 | BLS OEWS May 2006 [5] |
| 2007 | 3,680 | $61,140 | BLS OEWS May 2007 [5] |
| 2008 | 4,390 | $68,570 | BLS OEWS May 2008 [5] |
| 2009 | 4,430 | $69,620 | BLS OEWS May 2009 [5] |
| 2010 | 3,710 | $72,360 | BLS OEWS May 2010 [5] |
| 2011 | 2,830 | $73,670 | BLS OEWS May 2011 [5] |
| 2012 | 2,340 | $74,960 | BLS OEWS May 2012 [5] |
| 2013 | 2,690 | $72,430 | BLS OEWS May 2013 [5] |
| 2014 | 2,240 | $72,810 | BLS OEWS May 2014 [5] |
| 2015 | 2,620 | $73,760 | BLS OEWS May 2015 [5] |
| 2016 | 2,870 | $79,750 | BLS OEWS May 2016 [5] |
| 2017 | 2,770 | $79,650 | BLS OEWS May 2017 [5] |
| 2018 | 2,710 | $82,050 | BLS OEWS May 2018 [5] |
| 2019 | 2,630 | $83,420 | BLS OEWS May 2019 [5] |
| 2020 | 2,470 | $86,110 | BLS OEWS May 2020 [5] |
| 2021 | 2,640 | $92,910 | BLS OEWS May 2021 [5] |
| 2022 | 2,980 | $98,590 | BLS OEWS May 2022 [5] |
| 2023 | 2,890 | $101,770 | BLS OEWS May 2023 [5] |
| 2024 | 2,950 | $101,690 | BLS OEWS May 2024 [5] |
| 2025 | 2,260 | $106,030 | BLS OEWS May 2025 [5] |

## Sources (89)

### Employment series

1. [ERIC ED230462 — A History of the American Sociological Association, 1905-1980 (ASA membership and institutional scale, early decades)](https://eric.ed.gov/?id=ED230462), ERIC / American Sociological Association
2. [American Sociological Association — History of the ASA (membership scale and institutional growth, 1950s-1960s)](https://www.asanet.org/), American Sociological Association
3. [University of Minnesota College of Liberal Arts — Sociology Department History (faculty growth 1945-1975 documented)](https://cla.umn.edu/sociology/about/history), University of Minnesota
4. [BLS OES 2000 national estimates (flat file)](https://www.bls.gov/oes/special-requests/oes00nat.zip), Bureau of Labor Statistics
5. BLS OEWS, national cross-industry estimates (flat file), Bureau of Labor Statistics. Editions: [2003](https://www.bls.gov/oes/special-requests/oesm03nat.zip), [2004](https://www.bls.gov/oes/special-requests/oesm04nat.zip), [2005](https://www.bls.gov/oes/special-requests/oesm05nat.zip), [2006](https://www.bls.gov/oes/special-requests/oesm06nat.zip), [2007](https://www.bls.gov/oes/special-requests/oesm07nat.zip), [2008](https://www.bls.gov/oes/special-requests/oesm08nat.zip), [2009](https://www.bls.gov/oes/special-requests/oesm09nat.zip), [2010](https://www.bls.gov/oes/special-requests/oesm10nat.zip), [2011](https://www.bls.gov/oes/special-requests/oesm11nat.zip), [2012](https://www.bls.gov/oes/special-requests/oesm12nat.zip), [2013](https://www.bls.gov/oes/special-requests/oesm13nat.zip), [2014](https://www.bls.gov/oes/special-requests/oesm14nat.zip), [2015](https://www.bls.gov/oes/special-requests/oesm15nat.zip), [2016](https://www.bls.gov/oes/special-requests/oesm16nat.zip), [2017](https://www.bls.gov/oes/special-requests/oesm17nat.zip), [2018](https://www.bls.gov/oes/special-requests/oesm18nat.zip), [2019](https://www.bls.gov/oes/special-requests/oesm19nat.zip), [2020](https://www.bls.gov/oes/special-requests/oesm20nat.zip), [2021](https://www.bls.gov/oes/special-requests/oesm21nat.zip), [2022](https://www.bls.gov/oes/special-requests/oesm22nat.zip), [2023](https://www.bls.gov/oes/special-requests/oesm23nat.zip), [2024](https://www.bls.gov/oes/special-requests/oesm24nat.zip), [2025](https://www.bls.gov/oes/special-requests/oesm25nat.zip)

### Wage series

6. [AAUP Faculty Compensation Survey — Annual Report on the Economic Status of the Profession 1969-70 (assistant professor salaries at doctoral institutions, estimated median)](https://www.aaup.org/issues-higher-education/faculty-employment/faculty-compensation-survey), American Association of University Professors
7. [BLS OES 2000 national estimates (flat file)](https://www.bls.gov/oes/special-requests/oes00nat.zip), Bureau of Labor Statistics
8. BLS OEWS, national cross-industry estimates (flat file), Bureau of Labor Statistics. Editions: [2003](https://www.bls.gov/oes/special-requests/oesm03nat.zip), [2004](https://www.bls.gov/oes/special-requests/oesm04nat.zip), [2005](https://www.bls.gov/oes/special-requests/oesm05nat.zip), [2006](https://www.bls.gov/oes/special-requests/oesm06nat.zip), [2007](https://www.bls.gov/oes/special-requests/oesm07nat.zip), [2008](https://www.bls.gov/oes/special-requests/oesm08nat.zip), [2009](https://www.bls.gov/oes/special-requests/oesm09nat.zip), [2010](https://www.bls.gov/oes/special-requests/oesm10nat.zip), [2011](https://www.bls.gov/oes/special-requests/oesm11nat.zip), [2012](https://www.bls.gov/oes/special-requests/oesm12nat.zip), [2013](https://www.bls.gov/oes/special-requests/oesm13nat.zip), [2014](https://www.bls.gov/oes/special-requests/oesm14nat.zip), [2015](https://www.bls.gov/oes/special-requests/oesm15nat.zip), [2016](https://www.bls.gov/oes/special-requests/oesm16nat.zip), [2017](https://www.bls.gov/oes/special-requests/oesm17nat.zip), [2018](https://www.bls.gov/oes/special-requests/oesm18nat.zip), [2019](https://www.bls.gov/oes/special-requests/oesm19nat.zip), [2020](https://www.bls.gov/oes/special-requests/oesm20nat.zip), [2021](https://www.bls.gov/oes/special-requests/oesm21nat.zip), [2022](https://www.bls.gov/oes/special-requests/oesm22nat.zip), [2023](https://www.bls.gov/oes/special-requests/oesm23nat.zip), [2025](https://www.bls.gov/oes/special-requests/oesm25nat.zip)
9. [BLS OEWS May 2024, national cross-industry estimates (flat file)](https://www.bls.gov/oes/special-requests/oesm24nat.zip), U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics

### Tool eras

10. [Wikipedia — Chicago school (sociology): methods, key figures, and contributions (1892-1940)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chicago_school_%28sociology%29), Wikipedia
11. [ASA — Albion W. Small: founding of the University of Chicago Department of Sociology, 1892](https://www.asanet.org/albion-w-small/), American Sociological Association
12. [OpenStax Introduction to Sociology 3e — "The History of Sociology": Talcott Parsons and the Columbia school, quantitative methods ascendant](https://openstax.org/books/introduction-sociology-3e/pages/1-2-the-history-of-sociology), OpenStax
13. [Tandfonline — Surveys, Statisticians and Sociology: A History of Quantitative Methods (2014)](https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.11120/elss.2014.00028), Education, Learning and the Social Sciences
14. [Wikipedia — SPSS: history, development at Stanford 1968, dominance as social science statistical package](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SPSS), Wikipedia
15. [ResearchGate — Advancing Qualitative Research Using QDAS: ATLAS.ti and NVivo in published studies 1994-2013 (history and adoption of CAQDAS tools)](https://www.researchgate.net/publication/281323388_Advancing_Qualitative_Research_Using_Qualitative_Data_Analysis_Software_QDAS_Reviewing_Potential_Versus_Practice_in_Published_Studies_using_ATLASti_and_NVivo_1994-2013), ResearchGate / Social Science Computer Review
16. [IPUMS — Integrated Public Use Microdata Series: history and data infrastructure for social science research](https://www.ipums.org/), IPUMS / University of Minnesota
17. [arXiv 2412.08087 — From Division to Unity: A Large-Scale Study on the Emergence of Computational Social Science, 1990-2021](https://arxiv.org/pdf/2412.08087), arXiv
18. [Cambridge University Press — Teaching Computational Social Science for All (PS: Political Science and Politics, 2025)](https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/ps-political-science-and-politics/article/teaching-computational-social-science-for-all/66EAB886BCF21C647E2387051D6A9BEF), Cambridge University Press
19. [Davidson and Karell 2025 — Integrating Generative AI into Social Science Research: Measurement, Prompting, and Simulation (Sociological Methods and Research, doi:10.1177/00491241251339184)](https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/00491241251339184), Sociological Methods and Research / Sage
20. [Federal Reserve FEDS Notes — Educational Exposure to Generative Artificial Intelligence (February 2026): Social Sciences among highest LLM-exposed academic disciplines](https://www.federalreserve.gov/econres/notes/feds-notes/educational-exposure-to-generative-artificial-intelligence-20250226.html), Federal Reserve Board
21. [Hilkenmeier et al. 2025 — Evaluating the AI Tool Elicit as a Semi-Automated Second Reviewer for Data Extraction in Systematic Reviews (Sociological Methods and Research, doi:10.1177/08944393251404052)](https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/08944393251404052), Sociological Methods and Research / Sage

### Forecasts and exposure studies

22. [BLS Employment Projections 2025-35, National Employment Matrix: 19-3041 Sociologists (2025: 2.7 thousand; 2035: 2.8 thousand; +3.8%)](https://data.bls.gov/projections/nationalMatrix?queryParams=19-3041&ioType=o), Bureau of Labor Statistics
23. [Eloundou, Manning, Mishkin & Rock (2023), "GPTs are GPTs", occupation-level exposure data occ\_level.csv (O\*NET-SOC 19-3041.00, human-rated β 0.615)](https://github.com/openai/GPTs-are-GPTs/blob/main/data/occ_level.csv), OpenAI

### Historical notes

24. [Britannica — Albion W. Small: founding of the University of Chicago sociology department, 1892](https://www.britannica.com/biography/Albion-W-Small), Encyclopaedia Britannica
25. [ASA — Albion W. Small: founding of the American Journal of Sociology, 1895](https://www.asanet.org/albion-w-small/), American Sociological Association
26. [ERIC ED230462 — A History of the American Sociological Association, 1905-1980](https://eric.ed.gov/?id=ED230462), ERIC / American Sociological Association
27. [Wikipedia — Chicago school (sociology): peak influence 1915-1935, one-third of US graduate students](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chicago_school_%28sociology%29), Wikipedia
28. [Wikipedia — Talcott Parsons: Structure of Social Action 1937, dominant theoretical figure in postwar sociology](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talcott_Parsons), Wikipedia
29. [University of Minnesota College of Liberal Arts — Sociology Department History (faculty growth 1945-1975)](https://cla.umn.edu/sociology/about/history), University of Minnesota
30. [Wikipedia — SPSS: development at Stanford 1968, described as one of sociology's most influential texts](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SPSS), Wikipedia
31. [ASA — A History of the American Sociological Association 1981-2004 (federal funding cuts, early 1980s retrenchment)](https://www.asanet.org/wp-content/uploads/savvy/images/asa/docs/pdf/FINAL%20FINAL%20FINAL%20ASA%20History%20Boyd%20Used%20to%20Print%20the%20Book.PDF), American Sociological Association
32. [arXiv 2412.08087 — From Division to Unity: A Large-Scale Study on the Emergence of Computational Social Science, 1990-2021](https://arxiv.org/pdf/2412.08087), arXiv

### Predecessors & successors

33. [OpenStax Introduction to Sociology 3e — The History of Sociology: Auguste Comte coined "sociologie" in 1838, building on prior social philosophy](https://openstax.org/books/introduction-sociology-3e/pages/1-2-the-history-of-sociology), OpenStax
34. [ERIC ED230462 — A History of the American Sociological Association, 1905-1980 (social reform origins of the profession)](https://eric.ed.gov/?id=ED230462), ERIC / American Sociological Association
35. [ASA — Careers with a Sociology PhD: market research and UX research as leading non-academic destinations](https://www.asanet.org/academic-professional-resources/careers-with-a-sociology-phd/), American Sociological Association

### Present-day analysis

- [O\*NET 30.3 — Sociologists (19-3041.00)](https://www.onetonline.org/link/summary/19-3041.00), accessed 2026-05-24
- [BLS Occupational Outlook Handbook — Sociologists: median annual wage $99,270 (May 2023); +4% projected growth 2024–2034](https://www.bls.gov/ooh/life-physical-and-social-science/sociologists.htm), accessed 2026-05-24
- [Eloundou et al. 2024 — GPTs are GPTs (Science / arXiv 2303.10130)](https://arxiv.org/abs/2303.10130), accessed 2026-05-24
- [Davidson & Karell 2025 — Integrating Generative AI into Social Science Research: Measurement, Prompting, and Simulation (Sociological Methods & Research, doi:10.1177/00491241251339184)](https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/00491241251339184), accessed 2026-05-24
- [Schueller et al. 2026 — Evaluating AI-Assisted Deductive Coding in MAXQDA: A Methodological Analysis of Inputs and Outputs (Social Science Computer Review, doi:10.1177/16094069251407046)](https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/16094069251407046), accessed 2026-05-24
- [Springer Quality & Quantity 2025 — Thematic analysis of interview data with ChatGPT: designing and testing a reliable qualitative research protocol (doi:10.1007/s11135-025-02199-3)](https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s11135-025-02199-3?error=cookies_not_supported&code=03bed1cd-e786-42bf-a370-a99674c1bf62), accessed 2026-05-24
- [Hilkenmeier et al. 2025 — Evaluating the AI Tool "Elicit" as a Semi-Automated Second Reviewer for Data Extraction in Systematic Reviews (Sociological Methods & Research, doi:10.1177/08944393251404052)](https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/08944393251404052), accessed 2026-05-24
- [Federal Reserve FEDS Notes — Educational Exposure to Generative Artificial Intelligence (Feb 2026): Social Sciences among highest LLM-exposed academic disciplines](https://www.federalreserve.gov/econres/notes/feds-notes/educational-exposure-to-generative-artificial-intelligence-20250226.html), accessed 2026-05-24
- [Sonix — FERPA-compliant AI transcription for academic qualitative research: 99%+ accuracy, 53+ languages, NVivo/ATLAS.ti export-ready, 10 minutes per 2-hour interview (sonix.ai, 2025)](https://sonix.ai/resources/ferpa-compliant-transcription-software-research-academia/), accessed 2026-05-24
- [ATLAS.ti — Intentional AI Coding: automatically codes interview transcripts and focus group data using OpenAI GPT models; produces hierarchical code structure with explanatory comments (atlasti.com, 2025)](https://atlasti.com/research-hub/intentional-ai-coding), accessed 2026-05-24
- [Qualtrics — AI-powered survey analysis and dynamic question generation capabilities in XM Platform (qualtrics.com, 2025)](https://www.qualtrics.com/articles/strategy-research/ai-research-strategies/), accessed 2026-05-24

How to read these figures: https://futurehistory.earth/methodology. Every figure links to its own source; gaps stay gaps.