VOL. 2, NO. 6, September 2013 ISSN 2307-2466 International Journal of Economics, Finance and Management ©2013. All rights reserved. http://www.ejournalofbusiness.org 403 Determinants of Occupational Choice among Four Provinces of the Pakistan 1 Muhammad Irfan, 2 Sofia Anwar, 3 Waqar Akram, 4 Saima Ramzan, 5 Irum Waqar 1 Research scholar of M.Phill Economics at G.C University Faisalabad, Punjab, Pakistan 2 Associate Professor at Department of Economics G.C University Faisalabad, Punjab, Pakistan 3 Associate Professor at Department of Business Administration, Institute of Business Administration Sukkur, Sindh, Pakistan 4 Research scholar of M.Phill Economics at G.C University Faisalabad, Punjab, Pakistan 5 Assistant Professor at Department of Business Administration, Institute of Business Administration Sukkur, Sindh, Pakistan ABSTRACT An occupation symbolizes the social and economic position of an individual in the society. Therefore it is important to evaluate the structure of occupations and to emphasize the various determinants on the basis of which individuals make their occupational choices. The current study emphasize on the main objectives like the socioeconomic factors of occupational choice in Pakistan’s labor force market. Study sample of 69839 regular wage employees of age 16 years to 65years is taken from the Labor Force Survey 2009-10. The comparative analysis of occupational choice among provinces of the Pakistan is examined. The multinomial logistic model is applied for the analysis of occupational choices in Pakistan especially among four provinces. Age, Gender, Education, Training, Living time in the district of the employment and marital status are considered as explanatory variables in the Multinomial logit model. This study helps us to understand the reasons of the occupational choices among four provinces of the Pakistan. Keywords: Occupational choice, Provinces of Pakistan, Pakistan labor force market, Multinomial logit model 1. INTRODUCTION Occupational choice is a very serious issue because not only the individual’s future life depends upon it but also it participates in the development of a country. Occupations can enrich the production of a specific product, which may significantly participate in GDP of a country [1]. Furthermore to control the unemployment rate a country needs to highlight the occupations that are less participating. Occupational choice was not a dilemma, usually the profession of family head was adopted by the offspring. The son of a landlord would become a landlord and the son of a tenant would become a tenant the son of cobbler would become a cobbler and many other examples. With the awareness, acknowledgment, modernization and industrialization the demand for skilled labor force created in the market and people gradually move towards the selecting the jobs or professions [2]. Everyone is not fit for every occupation; peoples differ to one another with respect to preferences, utility, skills, productivity, strength, education, area of interest etc. As economic theory also speaks that peoples are different in productive capacity and opportunity cost related to the labor supply. When we considered labor services as a commodity in the labor market and labor is definitely different in its distinctiveness, so it cannot be measured as a homogenous service or commodity. These different capabilities are the determinant of an individual occupation selection. So individuals have to decide in which occupation they want to go [3]. Therefore the choice of a profession or selecting the career is a very important because the life of an individual will remain associated with that occupation he has chosen. If an individual fails to select the right profession then he or she may have to face the number of problems in whole the life that is why it is very important to choose the right profession. Generally we have 28 professions in our dataset; 1 International Labor Organization has categorized these 28 occupations into 9 major professions. Many studies have been conducted on occupational selection in Pakistan, this study addresses that issues that were not focused before. Our research provides an empirical evidence for occupational choice across the country. This research will contribute to know the determinants of occupational choice in each province of the Pakistan. It also compares the socioeconomic determinants of occupational choice among every province of the Pakistan. The data from a Pakistan labor force survey 2009-2010 is used for this study. This research study has following objectives. 1.1 Objectives • To find the social and economic determinants of career selection / occupational choice. • To compare the social and economic magnitudes of occupational choice among the four provinces of Pakistan. 1 Visit http://www.ilo.org/wcmsp5/groups/public/@dgreports /@stat/documents/meetingdocument/wcms_087943.pd f