As stated earlier in the chapter the National Statistics Socio-economic Classification system (NS-SEC) has replaced Socio-economic Group (SEG) and Social Class (see Appendix E), this new classification of households showed similar variations in ownership of consumer durables to those seen previously with respect to SEG. Those households headed by individuals in higher NS-SEC groups were generally more likely to have the newer type of consumer durable than households in the lower NS-SEC groups or those headed by an economically inactive person.

• Households in the managerial and professional groups were most likely to have a home computer (82%, 86% and 76% respectively) and those in the semi-routine and routine groups were the least likely to have a home computer (48% and 43% respectively). Twenty-four per cent of households headed by an economically inactive person had a home computer.
• Access to the internet from home followed the same pattern as access to home computers. Households in the managerial and professional groups being most likely to have access to the internet from home (76%, 79% and 66% respectively) and those in the semi-routine and routine groups the least likely (33% and 32% respectively). Only 17% of households headed by an economically inactive person had access to the internet from home.
• Mobile phones were most likely to be found in those households headed by people in the large employer and higher managerial group (93%) compared with 82% of intermediate households and 78% of the semi-routine group. Households headed by an economically inactive person were much less likely to have mobile phones than economically active households(45%).