The idea that 20% of Americans are truly professionals is absurd. Let's look at the subcategory of "Professional and related occupations" that is "Computer and mathematical occupations", more specifically, "Computer Support Specialists and Systems Administrators". Being a systems administrator, I have some hands-on knowledge of this. The BLS says:
http://www.bls.gov/oco/ocos268.htm
"Computer support specialists and systems administrators held about 758,000 jobs in 2002. Of these, about 507,000 were computer support specialists and about 251,000 were network and computer systems administrators."
OK, 758,000 people, that's a nice chunk of the US workforce (although many of them are actually here on H1B visas and whatnot). Now let's go down a bit:
"Median annual earnings of computer support specialists were $39,100 in 2002. The middle 50 percent earned between $29,760 and $51,680. The lowest 10 percent earned less than $23,060" [...] "Median annual earnings of network and computer systems administrators were $54,810 in 2002. The middle 50 percent earned between $43,290 and $69,530. The lowest 10 percent earned less than $34,460, and the highest 10 percent earned more than $86,440."
OK, so we have 50,700 people earning less than $23,060 a year being classified as professionals! Please. The only reason they're classified as professionals is because the ITAA lobbied that they be classified as such, so that the FLSA would not apply. And it's congruous to it - the FLSA doesn't kick in for so-called computer "professionals" unless they make less than $455 a week, and $455 times 52 is $23,660. So the bottom 10% don't even make it to where the FLSA defines professional for computer workers - $23,660, but they do make the BLS definition of professional. And remember, this 10% is not making $23,060 a year, it is making less than $23,060 a year, and is being called professional by the BLS. In legal/lobbyist/government land, these people may be professionals, but by any other realistic definition of the word, the 50,700 people earning less than $23,060 are not professionals. Nor are some of the people earning more than $23,060 people either.
So in the category I have been put in for my profession, I see extremely gross exaggeration of who is a professional. Which leads me to question the idea that 34.3% of Americans are professionals/managers. I think it should be remembered that these definitions are shifted around to avoid the FLSA in other professions, and the BLS plays along. In fact, it goes beyond even the FLSA definition, as I noted.
Lance