The effects of urban enclaves on the labour market outcomes of foreign-born migrants and ethnic minorities in the England

The ways in which enclaves affect residents labour market outcomes are not fully understood, with outcomes varying substantially across countries, migrant and ethnic groups. In this study, we examine how co-national and co-ethnic enclaves influence migrants’ and ethnic minorities’ labour market outcomes within England. We account for residential sorting through a computational causal modelling framework. Our analysis reveals three key findings. First, migrants and ethnic minorities with poor human capital were disproportionately found in neighbourhoods with high co-ethnic and co-national concentration. This suggests residential sorting occurs in UK enclaves. Second, co-national enclaves were associated with higher employment probabilities (but not higher incomes) amongst male migrants, and neutral to negative employment probabilities and incomes amongst female migrants. Third, co-ethnic enclaves were generally not associated with higher employment probabilities or income, suggesting UK co-ethnic networks do not help most minority ethnic groups to find work. To our knowledge, this study represents the first evidence of positive co-national employment effects within the UK context. These findings could inform policy by highlighting groups whose employment rates are negatively affected by enclaves. These include female migrants and women of Indian, Pakistani and Bangladeshi ethnicity.