The Class Pay Gap in Higher Professional and Managerial Occupations
| Dates: | 18 May 2016 |
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| Times: | 13:00 - 14:00 |
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| What is it: | Seminar |
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| Organiser: | methods@manchester |
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| Who is it for: | University staff, Adults, Alumni, Current University students |
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| Speaker: | Dr Sam Friedman |
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The hidden barriers, or ‘gender pay gap’, preventing women from earning equivalent incomes to men is well documented. Yet in this talk we demonstrate that, in Britain, there is also a comparable ‘class origin pay gap’ in higher professional and managerial occupations. We find that even when those from working-class backgrounds are successful in entering high-status occupations, they earn sixteen percent less, on average, than those from privileged backgrounds. This class-origin pay gap translates to up to £7,350 lower annual earnings. This difference is partly explained by the upwardly mobile being employed in smaller firms and working outside London, but it remains substantial even net of a variety of important predictors of earnings. These findings illustrate how, even beyond occupational entry, the socially mobile often face a significant and previously undetected earnings “class ceiling” within high-status occupations.
This seminar is presented by Dr Sam Friedman of LSE.
Sam Friedman is Assistant Professor in Sociology at the London School of Economics. He has written widely on class and culture and is the author of Comedy and Distinction: The Cultural Currency of a ‘Good’ Sense of Humour (Routledge, 2014). His current research, funded by an ESRC Future Research Leaders grant, examines social mobility into Britain’s elite occupations. The most recent article to emerge from this work, forthcoming in the American Sociological Review (with Daniel Laurison), demonstrates that those from working-class backgrounds face a powerful and previously unrecognised ‘class pay gap’ within higher professional and managerial occupations.
Speaker
Dr Sam Friedman
Role: Assistant Professor in Sociology
Organisation: The London School of Economics and Political Science
Travel and Contact Information
Find event
Hanson Room
Humanities Bridgeford Street
Manchester
