How Many People Actually Get to Dress Like Mark Zuckerberg at Work?

If you’ve watched even a single episode of HBO’s Silicon Valley, you might have noticed something different about the way the scrappy web developer heroes dress for work. Their flip-flops, shorts and hoodies are a far cry from business casual.

The relaxed look of the west coast tech scene can be credited to startup billionaires like Mark Zuckerberg, who himself boasts a notoriously casual look at work. But if you don’t work in the tech scene, you might be wondering if anyone else besides the Zuck gets to pull of the extra-casual look at their job. It turns out there are more people dressing this way around the office than you might think.

More Companies Have Casual Dress Codes These Days

After surveying 30,000 workers, PayScale found some interesting data in terms of dress codes across the United States. We broke the options down into four categories:

• Work Uniforms: “We have specific work uniforms.”
• Business Formal: “Tie and jacket for men, pant- or skirt-suits for women.”
• Casual: “The Zuckerberg: anything goes within reason.”
• Business Casual: “No jeans, sneakers or flip-flops.”

What we’ve found is that casual dress codes, a.k.a. the Zuckerberg look, is the second most common dress code in the U.S. The pie chart below provides a full breakdown of office dress codes across the nation.

Which Industries Have Casual Dress Codes?

Although most of the industries with casual dress codes tend to be related to manufacturing and technology, there are some unexpected industries where you will find casual dress codes.

Dress Codes By Income Brackets

PayScale also broke out the numbers by income bracket, so we can see how dress code correlates with salary. The highest percentage of workers who have a business formal dress code earn $160,000 or more. Business casual workers tend to earn in the $100, 000 to $119,000 bracket, while casual dress workers tend to cluster around the $0 to $19,000 bracket.

Tell Us What You Think!

Do you have a formal dress code at work? We want to hear from you! Comment below or join the discussion on Twitter!