Ethnicity, age, work and health inequalities

Overview

Recall questions on Heath and Cheung's ethnic penalty, institutional racism and differences between minority ethnic groups, ethnic inequality beyond employment, ageism and the position of young and older people, deindustrialisation, Standing's precariat, Barron and Norris's dual labour market, the Black Report on health, and official statistics on inequality.

What you need to know

Answer each one before you reveal it.

Questions from this subtopic

Each one with the model answer underneath.

1. 1

   What do sociologists mean by an ethnic penalty?

   Model answer

   The ethnic penalty, a term associated with Heath and Cheung, is the disadvantage in pay, employment or promotion that members of a minority ethnic group still face once qualifications, age, region and other measurable factors have been taken into account.

2. 2

   Define institutional racism.

   Model answer

   Institutional racism is discrimination built into the ordinary routines, rules and culture of an organisation, so that it disadvantages minority ethnic people even where no individual within it intends to discriminate; the term entered mainstream debate through the 1999 Macpherson Report.

3. 3

   Why is it misleading to treat minority ethnic groups as a single category when describing inequality?

   Model answer

   Outcomes differ sharply between groups: pupils of Chinese and Indian heritage tend to achieve above the national average at school while Gypsy, Roma and Traveller pupils achieve well below it, and employment rates and average pay also vary widely, so one label conceals the pattern instead of revealing it.

4. 4

   Name three areas of social life beyond employment where ethnic inequality can be evidenced, and give the pattern in each.

   Model answer

   Housing, where minority ethnic households are more likely to live in overcrowded or poor-quality accommodation; health, where several groups have worse outcomes and poorer experiences of services; and the criminal justice system, where Black people are stopped, searched and imprisoned at disproportionate rates.

5. 5

   Define ageism.

   Model answer

   Ageism is prejudice or discrimination against people because of their age, whether they are young or old, and age is one of the characteristics protected by the Equality Act 2010.

6. 6

   Which disadvantages do young workers face in the labour market?

   Model answer

   Young people have consistently higher unemployment rates than older adults, are concentrated in low-paid service work, are far more likely to be on zero-hours or temporary contracts, and are entitled to lower minimum wage rates than adults doing the same job.

Other ways to work this

The same content, four other ways.

What is inside Levo

Six ways to work the same material.