Why migrants earn less: in search of the factors producing the ethno-migrant pay gap in a Dutch public organization

Hans Siebers and Jilles van Gastel
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Hans Siebers: Tilburg University, the Netherlands
Jilles van Gastel: Universidad Austral de Chile, Chile

Work, Employment & Society, 2015, vol. 29, issue 3, 371-391

Abstract: In many countries, migrant/ethnic minority workers earn less than non-migrant/ethnic majority employees. This pay gap is not only attributable to migrant/ethnic minority employees having acquired less human capital or social capital, to the impact of government policies and to discrimination. Based on both qualitative and quantitative data collected in 2010, this case study of the job segregation component of the wage disadvantages of migrant employees in a Dutch public organization identifies several other factors. Migrant workers’/ethnic minority employees’ lower levels of participation in work-related communication and the application of socio-ideological labour control also widen this earnings gap. Moreover, migrant workers’/ethnic minority employees’ institutional and relational uncertainties, due to their subordinated position in Dutch society, help to explain their lower levels of participation in work-related communication and how socio-ideological labour control works out negatively for them.

Keywords: discrimination; ethnic pay gap; ethnic penalties; immigrants; institutional uncertainty; job segregation; labour market; migrant workers; wage disadvantages; work-related communication (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2015
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:sae:woemps:v:29:y:2015:i:3:p:371-391

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