Category Archives: Gender inequalities

Stung by Pension Reforms: The Impact of a Change in State Pension Age on Women and their Partners

In many developed countries, pension systems are being reformed by increasing the age eligibility to receive the state pension and by reducing its generosity. The aim of these reforms has been to improve the financial sustainability of the system by encouraging people to work at older ages. However, these reforms also tend to have negative effects on wellbeing and to increase in inequality based for example on level of education and on family structure.

Our research focuses on the effect that the increase in the UK state pension age had on women born in the 1950s.  We found that the increase in the state pension age had the desired effect of keeping more women in the labour market (either employed, self-employed or seeking work), but also had negative effects on their mental health and on other aspects of wellbeing.  The reform had a more negative impact on more vulnerable women, for example, it had a larger negative impact on mental and financial wellbeing of women without a degree (compared to women with a degree), and of women without (compared to women with) a partner.

Della Giusta, M., Longhi S. (2021) Stung by Pension Reforms: The Unequal Impact of Changes in State Pension Age on UK Women and their Partners, Labour Economics, 72:102049.

Employment and Earning Differences in the Early Career of Ethnic Minority British Graduates

Ethnic minorities in the U.K. are more likely than the white majority to gain university qualifications, but experience worse labour market outcomes on average. This paper compares employment and earnings of British graduates from ethnic minorities to those of white British graduates to analyse whether ethnic labour market differences exist among the highly qualified, and whether they can be explained by differences in parental background, local area characteristics or differences in university careers. These factors account for a substantial part of persistent ethnic differences in earnings, but explain very little of the differences in employment. Compared to the literature estimating ethnic labour market inequalities on people with any level of qualification, we find smaller ethnic differences in employment and almost no differences in earnings among graduates entering the labour market. The results are robust to various changes in model specification.

Zwysen W., Longhi S. (2018) Employment and Earning Differences in the Early Career of Ethnic Minority British Graduates: the Importance of University Career, Parental Background and Area Characteristics, Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies, 44(1) 154-172.

The Ethnicity Pay Gap

Research Report for the Equality and Human Rights Commission (EHRC):
Longhi, S. and Brynin, M. (2017) The Ethnicity Pay Gap, Equality and Human Rights Commission, Research Report 108.

Here you can listen to a talk and a related podcast on The Ethnicity Pay Gap organised by the Social Market Foundation and the Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC) within the Ask the Expert Series.  You can also read a short blog on the Ethnicity Pay Gap Reporting published on the ESRC website.