Derek Leslie

Staying on in Full-Time Education: Reasons for Higher Participation Rates among Ethnic Minority Males and Females

Individuals from ethnic minorities have a greater tendency to stay on in full-time education beyond the compulsory age. There are, however, wide variations between groups, and the paper explores the role for human capital considerations, such as earnings and increased employability, in this choice. Economic considerations and socioeconomic background are found to be important but there is evidence for a separate ethnicity effect influencing choice. The method used is to fit a joint leaving and employment equation for males and females aged 18-24 using combined micro data from the British Labour Force Survey and the Sample of Anonymized Records from the 1991 Census. Copyright 1999 by The London School of Economics and Political Science

The ethnic wage gap and employment differentials in the 1990s: Evidence for Britain

Abstract It is twenty years since Britain passed legislation to combat racial discrimination. Despite this, Britains nonwhite ethnic minorities still appear to face substantial amounts of discrimination in the labour market. Unemployment is particularly severe.

Unemployment among Britain's Ethnic Minorities

Using a sample of over 100,000 males from the Labour Force Survey, this paper explores the employment prospects of different ethnic groups. There are significant differences across groups so that discrimination studies that consider ethnic minorities as one homogeneous group involve a large degree of approximation. The paper pays particular attention to the considerable differences between the Indian and Pakistani/Bangladeshi groups. It argues that the differences are not the result of different levels of discrimination by the White majority, rather the predominately Muslim Pakistani/Bangladeshi community is less assimilated compared with other ethnic minority groups. Copyright 1999 by Blackwell Publishers Ltd and The Victoria University of Manchester

The Impact of Language Ability on Employment and Earnings of Britain’s Ethnic Communities

The Fourth National Survey of Ethnic Minorities contains useful information about the language ability of Britains non-whites as well as a wealth of comparative information for whites. The paper attempts to establish how much of the lower unemployment and higher earnings enjoyed by whites is the result of a comparative advantage in language. Language is shown to contribute to a part of the non-white disadvantage, but after language effects are removed non-whites males still have higher unemployment rates and lower earnings. Language disadvantage among non-white females leads to higher inactivity rates rather than more unemployment. Copyright 2001 by The London School of Economics and Political Science

A Picture of Male and Female Unemployment among Britain's Ethnic Minorities

Using a sample of around one million observations from the 1991 Census, the paper investigates unemployment differences across Britains ethnic minorities. Unemployment differences are not simply the result of characteristic differences or discrimination by the white majority. There are equally wide differences in female unemployment rates, compared with males, between the white majority and the non-white ethnic minorities. Unemployment rates among the British born tend to be considerably higher than foreign born, but this is accounted for by characteristic differences. Thus there is no evidence that the British born are actually doing worse, but they do not seem to be becoming better assimilated either. Coauthors are Stephen Drinkwater, Derek Leslie, and Philip Murphy. Copyright 1997 by Scottish Economic Society.

Black-white male earnings and employment prospects in the 1970s and 1980s evidence for Britain

Abstract Using a sample of around 80,000 whites and 2500 blacks, the paper highlights not just the economic disadvantage of blacks but also that this disadvantage worsened in the 1980s in Britain.

Why people from the UK's minority ethnic communities achieve weaker degree results than whites

People from the UKs minority ethnic communities achieve less good degree results than whites. The paper explores some reasons for this under-performance. By analysing a large sample of around two million observations a measure of the quality of qualifications among those accepted into Higher Education is developed. It is found that ethnic minorities are less well qualified than whites. This is because proportionately more are accepted into Higher Education, so lower average quality is unsurprising. Subject choice is also found to have an influence because ethnic minorities choose subjects where it is more difficult to achieve a good degree.

Recent Trends in Higher Education Applications and Acceptances

Using a data‐set published by the Universities and Colleges Admissions Service, patterns of demand and supply for higher education courses from 1996/97 to 1999/2000 are analysed. Most universities saw a fall in applications and enrolments following the introduction of tuition fees, although this effect varies across institutions and regions of the UK. A model of applications and acceptances is developed and tested. Applications are sensitive to institutional reputation and location of a university within the UK. Acceptances depend on teaching funding per head and the number of funded places each institution is given.

Using success to measure quality in British higher education: which subjects attract the best-qualified students?

Summary. A theory is developed to measure the quality of applicants into UK higher education. It is based on the principle that more able applicants will self-select into more difficult subject choices. The advantage is that it gives a unidimensional measure whereby different groups can easily be compared across any dimension of interest, e.g. men, women and the various ethnic groups. Here the relative quality of applicants and acceptances across 170 separate subject groups is calculated and discussed by using a data set with over 2 million observations. It, therefore, offers a way of achieving a more refined measure of the quality of human capital.

Ethnicity and self-employment earnings in Britain 1973-95

Using data from the General Household Survey 1973-95, it is shown that there were substantial differences between the earnings of whites and nonwhites in the self-employment sector of the British labour market over the period. Fitting a model of earnings determination which takes account of sample selectivity allows these differences to be decomposed into characteristics and coefficients effects. It turns out that both are important. Further decomposition reveals a crucial role for differences in the amount of schooling received by whites and nonwhites and in the returns to age, gender, marital status and qualifications.