Ethnic and Religious Penalties in a Changing British Labour Market from 2002 to 2010: The Case of Unemployment

Abstract

Most analyses of ethnic penalties in the UK labour market focus on one source of minority-group disadvantage only: colour racism, based on people's self-identified ethnicity. Some authors have argued that operating alongside those penalties, and in general exacerbating them, are further disadvantages reflecting cultural racism: in the UK it is argued that particular religious groups suffer these additional penalties—especially Muslims. A number of studies have confirmed the presence of these two types of disadvantage, but almost all of them have used cross-sectional data only and so were unable to test directly whether the penalties are more severe at times of economic recession and growing cultural tensions—such as those experienced in the UK after 9/11 and 7/7. This paper provides clear evidence of both the anticipated dual penalties and their increase at the end of the decade, using a very large annual cross-sectional survey for the years 2002 to 2010.