Women from ethnic minorities lose out at work

Pakistani, Bangladeshi and Black Caribbean women experience significant difficulties in getting jobs and progressing within them, and tend to be segregated into certain types of work, a two year investigation by the Equal Opportunities Commission (EOC) has discovered. This is despite leaving school with similar aspirations to white girls and similar or better qualifications than white boys.

“Time after time,” said EOC chair Jenny Watson, “women told us about the ‘unwritten rules’ in their workplace, hidden barriers that prevent them from realising these ambitions.”

In areas with above average numbers of black and Asian women in the labour market, the EOC found them to be absent from three-out-of-ten workplaces and unrepresented in almost three-out-of-five.


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Visible Minorities in the workplace: foreign educational credentials not seen as on par with Canadian equivalents

Preliminary findings from a national research study by Catalyst Canada and the Diversity Institute in Management and Technology at Ryerson University sheds new light on the recognition of foreign educational credentials. The study, which examines the career development and advancement of visible minorities in Corporate Canada, is based on the responses from more than 6000 professionals, managers and executives in Canadian corporations and professional service firms. These findings are part of a larger study in progress: Career Advancement in Corporate Canada: A Focus on Visible Minorities.

By 2017, visible minorities are expected to represent one in five people in Canada’s available workforce. In major cities across the country, the visible minority representation in the labour force will be closer to half.

While the labour market experiences of unemployed and under-employed immigrants have been well documented, much less is known about the career experiences of visible minority professionals, managers and executives. This is especially true when it comes to those employed in large Canadian businesses – the place where skills and opportunity come together most directly.

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Mentors Offer Guidance to Small-Business Owners

Well, not literally, of course, which is why seemingly the only friends the $1.4 trillion industry has are the ones it buys.

Al Gore, Dan Quayle, John Snow and Madeleine Albright are all on one hedgie payroll or another, their trading duties likely limited to trading on their good names. But, somehow, the real power brokers in New York and Washington don't seem especially impressed.

The SEC has just begun a major probe of suspected information leaks between big brokers and hedge funds. This is on top of the coming examinations of hedge funds that have voluntarily registered with the agency, after mandatory registration requirements were thrown out in court. Oh, and the feds also plan to shrink the pool of U.S. residents eligible to invest in hedge funds by approximately 85%. And they're working on a database designed to ferret out illegal hedge-fund trades in concert with exchange regulators.

Meanwhile, banking regulators are trying to make sure that their charges don't lend hedge funds too much money. The Massachusetts attorney general wants to crack down on the incentives brokers offer hedge funds to trade through them. Germany has made international regulation of hedge funds the cornerstone of its financial diplomacy. And, of course, Congress stands ready to subpoena anyone who manages to escape this dragnet with a few billion in pocket change.

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