Young white workers at bottom of pay scale

Young white Britons earn less than their BAME counterparts, the Office for National Statistics has found. For those aged 16-29 in 2019, the pay gap between white workers and ethnic minority workers was -5.5 per cent. Young workers of Chinese, Arab, Indian, black African and black Caribbean ethnicity earned more than their white British peers. Overall, there was a 2.3 per cent gap in favour of white workers, with white people aged 30 and over 7.3 per cent better off.

YOUNG white Britons earn less than their BAME counterparts, figures have shown, as the ethnic minority pay gap reached its lowest ever level.

The Office for National Statistics found that overall there was a 2.3 per cent gap in earnings between white and ethnic minority employees in England and Wales last year. This is a fall from 5.1 per cent in 2012 when records began, and from a high of 8.4 per cent in 2014.

White employees earned on average £12.40 per hour, compared with £12.11 for those in 17 ethnic minority groups.

Researchers found that ethnicity pay gaps differed by age group. Among those aged 30 and over, ethnic minorities earned less than those of white workers, but for those aged 16-29, people from ethnic minorities earned more than their white counterparts.

In 2019, for the 30-and-over group, the pay gap between white people and ethnic minority people was 7.3 per cent, but for the 16-29s, it was -5.5 per cent.

Young workers of Chinese, Arab, Indian, black African and black Caribbean ethnicity earned more than their white British peers.

The gap is calculated as the difference between the average hourly earnings of ethnic groups and white or white British employees, as a proportion of the average hourly earnings of the latter. Overall, most of the minority ethnic groups analysed earned less than white British employees. However, the ONS said that some ethnic groups had consistently earned more than white British workers since 2012.

Dr Halima Begum, director of the Runnymede Trust race equality charity, said: “We would welcome any data that shows the pay disparity gap is closing.

“Obviously, it is clear that there are factors at play, including socio- economic, that means some groups are still being paid less than others for equal work. Almost half of Pakistanis have a degree, a higher figure than their white British peers, yet they are the lowerpaid cohort.

“There clearly isn’t a level playing field for all BAME groups. So we have to start asking ourselves if invisible factors are at play, like unconscious biases and sometimes very conscious biases, including Islamophobia. These sorts of bias are extremely difficult to measure, and certainly are not reflected in the ONS data.”

The study also found that the gap is larger for men than women, although men earn more than women across most ethnic groups. In 2019, ethnic minority men earned 6.1 per cent less than white men, while the hourly pay of ethnic minority women was 2.1 per cent more than white women.

The ONS analysed data on earnings from the Annual Population Survey.