ABSTRACT In the recent political and academic debate over social exclusivity and inequality in Britain, accountancy has come in for specific criticism. The Milburn panel on fair access to the professions concluded that accountancy has seen the greatest decline in social mobility. Through the use of a postal questionnaire of members of the Institute of Chartered Accountants in England and Wales (ICAEW), this study challenges this assessment by demonstrating that historically the ICAEW has always had a significant proportion of members from the lower middle and working classes. However, in recent decades there has been an increase in the proportion from the upper middle class and a decline in those from the lower classes. This shift was not due to educational changes such as the decline of grammar schools or the rise of the graduate profession but resulted from the reduced role of medium- and small-sized firms in recruitment and training and the rise in importance of the largest accounting firms which have always tended to take on trainees from higher social backgrounds.

中文翻译：

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两次世界大战期间至今ICAEW成员的社会阶层和社会流动性

摘要 在最近关于英国社会排他性和不平等的政治和学术辩论中，会计受到了具体的批评。米尔本职业公平机会小组得出的结论是，会计行业的社会流动性下降幅度最大。通过使用英格兰和威尔士特许会计师协会 (ICAEW) 成员的邮寄问卷，本研究通过证明 ICAEW 历史上一直有很大比例的成员来自中下层和工人阶级来挑战这一评估。然而，近几十年来，中上阶层的比例有所增加，而中下阶层的比例有所下降。