Research

Minding the minority gap

It has been claimed it will take at least another two decades to resolve the pay gap between men and women. But what about pay gaps right across the so-called equality strands of age, disability, ethnicity, gender, religion or faith and sexual orientation? Research by the Institute for Social and Economic Research (ISER) looks at whether some minority groups are worse off than others and questions if seemingly obvious solutions, like better qualifications, are the only way to improve the situation.

Researchers in ISER have been looking at pay gaps

The study showed that all ethnic minority women had pay gaps relative to white British men. Among men, pay gaps for Pakistani, Bangladeshi and Black African men were the highest, especially for men with lower qualifications. Conversely, Indian and Chinese men were not disadvantaged and in some cases were better paid than their white British male counterparts, although once qualifications were taken into account, they did experience a pay penalty. Pay gaps between men and women of the same group were apparent only for the white British and Indian groups.

Women of all religious backgrounds were disadvantaged relative to Christian men, with Sikh and Muslim women having the largest pay gaps. Muslim men were around 17 per cent worse off compared with the same group. Jewish men were around 37 per cent better off.

Disabled women were 22 per cent worse off than able bodied men, while the gap between disabled men and non-disabled men was 11 per cent. While that is a figure that is likely to prompt considerable debate, the gap is still smaller than that between non-disabled men and women, which stands at 16 per cent. Having high level qualifications appeared to make little or no difference to the pay gaps relative to similarly-qualified non-disabled people.  

Commenting on the findings, Lucinda Platt said: ‘There are clear pay penalties for women, certain ethnic minorities and disabled people. Getting better qualifications isn’t the only way to achieve parity of pay.’

This research was commissioned by the Equalities and Human Rights Commission. The full report is available at: www.equalityhumanrights.com.

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Playing the accounting game

Funding worth £25,000 has been given to the University to work on an online game series that aids learning for university and continuing professional development students.

The Iceni Fund supports seedcorn proposals at an earlier stage than traditional venture capitalists, regarding the strength of the business case as of key importance. Essex Business School’s Dr Lisa Jack successfully bid for this grant to support Undercover Learning, a suite of online educational tools she developed with assistance from the University’s Research and Enterprise Office (REO).

Dr Jack explains: ‘We aim to use the funding to put Undercover Learning in a position to launch as a stand alone entity.’

The games are based on visual search, find and evaluate principles. The player is asked questions via an on-screen PDA and must go through a virtual environment created using photographs, diagrams, documents and audio-visual resources. The player explores by clicking on hotspots. These games and assessments are created using online templates so require no programming skills.

Dr Jack added: ‘Undercover Learning emphasises formative learning – the benefit is that students understand how what they are learning can be applied beyond the classroom and receive feedback even when working alone. In a classroom setting, tutors assess whether the student has understood what they were taught.’

The first game, Undercover Accountant, comprises a suite of nine games for accounting students who form a team of accountants entering organisations to identify poor practices and fraud. This is grounded in what auditors and forensic accountants do. Dr Jack and the REO’s Susannah Morley are in discussions with interested parties from different disciplines, including veterinary science. These educational tools will soon be available to institutions, companies and professional bodies.

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Also in the printed January edition of Wyvern:

• Researchers shed light on bacterial resistance
• Making novels explained
• How risky are first-time buyers?