Ethnicity pay gaps are compounding the gender pay gap for women of colour, producing even more financial disparity with men, revealed a new report, published by Fawcett Society to mark Ethnicity Pay Gap Day.
The gender equality charity published a report, entitled Double Trouble: The Ethnicity Gender Pay Gap, created by #EthnicityPayGap Campaign founder Dianne Greyson. The report highlights how ethnicity pay gaps compound the gender pay gap for women from Black and minority ethnic backgrounds.
“The ethnicity pay gap is a real problem, which is why I’ve campaigned so hard on this issue,” stated Dianne Greyson, founder of the #EthnicityPayGap campaign. “This Ethnicity Pay Gap Day, we must see employers committing to closing the gap. We need transparency and we need this Government to put in place mandatory ethnicity pay gap reporting. Unless companies know what their pay gap is and who it hits hardest, how can they begin to close it? We need more employers sharing knowledge and putting this issue at the top of their agenda. I’m looking forward to discussing this further at our ethnicity pay gap summit in February.”
ETHNICITY PAY GAPS
There is not one singular ethnicity pay gap, but rather different pay gaps for different ethnic groups. These ethnicity pay gaps are usually calculated as the difference in average pay between a particular ethnic group and a chosen reference group, as a percentage of the reference group’s pay. The reference group is often White employees.
Women from Black and minority groups see the compound effects of both the gender and ethnicity pay gaps, which are referred to as the Ethnicity Gender Pay Gap. Women of Bangladeshi, Pakistani, and Mixed White and Black Caribbean heritage see the largest ethnicity pay gaps of 14.7%, 11.8% and 10.6% respectively, compared to White British women. However, Fawcett’s own analyses of ONS data highlight that compared to White British men, these pay gaps rise even further to 28.4%, 25.9%, and 25%, respectively. Overall, men earned more than women in most ethnicity groups in 2022, with the exception of Black Caribbean and ‘Other’ Black heritage groups. However, in these two groups, women only earned marginally more than men, and less than men in other ethnic groups.
ONS data from 2022 (released in 2023) shows that the greatest ethnicity pay gaps were seen for people of Mixed White and Black Caribbean, Bangladeshi, and Pakistani heritage, who earned 18.5%, 17.5%, and 13.3% less than White British people, respectively. Whilst some ethnic groups earned more than White British people on average in 2022, the ONS highlights that after keeping personal and work characteristics constant, most ethnic minority employees earned less than UK-born white employees.
PAY DISCRIMINATION & BIAS
Fawcett’s research has found that gender pay gap is likely to be the result of bias. One aspect of this is illegal pay discrimination – where individual women earn less than their male colleagues for equal work. This continues to persist and contribute to the ethnicity and gender pay gaps. The 2022 #EthnicityPayGapCampaign research report highlights that in a survey of Black women, 52% had experienced being paid less than white colleagues in the same role, with many speaking about being turned down for promotion and their experiences of health problems related to workplace stress and marginalisation.3
Fawcett’s 2022 joint report with the Runnymede Trust, Broken Ladders, found that institutional racism is common in all sectors, with 75% of women of colour having experienced racism at work, 27% having suffered racial slurs, and 42% reporting being passed over for promotion despite good feedback (compared to 27% for white women).4 Furthermore, women are not being promoted equitably. Fawcett’s 2022 Sex and Power report highlighted that women from Black and minority ethnic groups remain almost entirely absent in the UK most senior positions. For example, no FTSE 100 CEOs were women of colour.
ETHNICITY MOTHERHOOD PENALTY
Fawcett’s 2023 report The Ethnicity Motherhood Pay Penalty analysed Labour Force Survey data over the last three decades, demonstrating how gender, ethnicity, and parenthood intersect to produce even greater wage gaps for Black and minoritised mothers, particularly mothers of Pakistani and Bangladeshi heritage – who saw a 13% pay gap and a 17-percentage point difference in employment rate compared to women of the same ethnicity without children. This group are also least likely to receive supplementary maternity pay and paid leave, due to a greater chance of being in insecure work contracts.
A lack of culturally inclusive early childhood education and care is a significant barrier to economic participation, with 90% of White British parents taking up their free ECEC hours for 3- 4-year-olds, compared to three quarters of Black parents and two thirds of parents of Pakistani and Bangladeshi heritage. Finally, over double the proportion of mothers of Black African heritage compared to white mothers reported that they had no access to flexible work, which is why they are more likely to consider leaving their jobs due to lack of flexibility than white workers (32% compared to 21%).
DOUBLE TROUBLE FOR WOMEN OF COLOUR
The gender pay gap is closing at a glacial pace, but it doesn’t tell the whole story, according to Jemima Olchawski, Chief Executive of the Fawcett Society. “The ethnicity pay gap is creating a double trouble for Black and minoritised women in the UK. The figures that we have are so very stark – that women of Bangladeshi heritage are earning on average close to a third less per hour than white British men should be a national outrage.”
Olchawski believes urgent intervention is needed to start to close these huge gaps so that no woman, regardless of background, is left behind. “Mandatory gender pay gap reporting has effectively exposed and driven action to close the pernicious gender pay gap. We are urging government to make reporting on the basis of ethnicity mandatory as well. But we must go further, and ensure that companies with persistent gaps are required to publish action plans for closing them, and held to account when they do not,” she concluded.
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Ethnicity Pay Gap Day 2024: 8th January
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