Ethnicity

• How does Ethnicity affect life chances?:

  • A female Black African has an expected life expectancy of 88.9 whereas a female White British has an expected life expectancy of 83.1
  • Males and females in White and Mixed ethnic groups have a lower life expectancy than all other ethnic groups.
  • The Black ethnic group has had the highest amount of infant mortality rate each year with a rate of 6.4 deaths per 1,000 live births in 2019.
  • White ethnic groups consistently have a lower infant mortality rate, in 2021 the rate was 3.0 deaths per 1,000 live births.
• How does Ethnicity affect life chances?:

  • During covid people who were in the ethnic minority were almost 3 times more likely to catch Covid-19 and 4 times more likely to die from it.
  • Indian (7%), Chinese (10%), and White Other (11%) households had lower rates for renting houses.
  • Black African (44%), Mixed White (41%), and Black Caribbean (40%) were most likely to rent social housing out of all of the ethnic groups.
  • 10% of White youths are unemployed compared to 19% BAME and 24% Bangladesh Black women are 5 times more likely to die in Britain during childbirth.
• Ethnicity - the putting (classification) of people into ethnic groups e.g. White British, Black African Caribbean, Indian.
• Ethnic group - a social group whose members share an identity based on their cultural traditions or cultural characteristics (e.g. religion, language, food etc)
• Ethnic minority - an ethnic group who is smaller than the ethnic majority. For example, in the UK, White British is the ethnic majority so any other group is a minority (e.g. Indian, Chinese etc). They may have a disadvantaged position in society because of this.
• Life chances - an individual's chances of achieving positive or negative outcomes (relating for example, to health, education, housing) as they progress through life. So simply, the chances they have in their lifetime based on their social background.
• Prejudice - a pre-judgement in favour of, or against a person, group or issue. Prejudice involves opinions and beliefs rather than action.
• Discrimination - the unjust or prejudicial treatment of different categories of people, especially on the grounds of CAGE. This is the treatment part.
• Racism - occurs when people are treated differently and less favourably on the basis of their ethnicity. It's the belief that one ethnic group is 'superior' to another.
• Institutional racism - when the way an organisation works has the effect, possibly unintentionally, of discriminating against people of a particular ethnic group.