ADR UK Research Fellows: Annual Survey of Hours and Earnings linked to Migrant Workers Scan
Categories: Research using linked data, ADR UK Research Fellows, ADR England, Office for National Statistics, ADR UK Partnership, Social mobility & inclusion, Employment & the economy
24 August 2026
ADR UK is funding a fellowship to conduct public good research using the Annual Survey of Hours and Earnings (ASHE) linked to Migrant Workers Scan – England, Scotland and Wales dataset.
The Migrant Workers Scan is a standalone, but fully linkable, dataset based on the 1% sample of individuals included in ASHE. It contains information on overseas nationals who have registered for, and been allocated, a National Insurance Number, including date of arrival in the UK, nationality, and country of residence immediately prior to arrival. When linked to ASHE, which holds detailed pay, occupation and employment records, this provides a far richer picture of migrants' role in the UK labour market than either dataset can offer alone.
This linkage allows researchers to move beyond partial snapshots of migrant employment towards a fuller understanding of wage progression, job mobility and participation in different sectors, helping to build evidence on both the challenges migrants face and the contributions they make to the economy.
This fellowship forms part of ADR UK's wider programme to support public good research using flagship linked datasets, offering researchers the opportunity to generate new, policy-relevant evidence to improve lives.
Learn more about the Research Fellow and project below:
Dr Ross McKenzie
Why firms matter for immigrant pay gaps in the UK
Longstanding pay differences between immigrant and UK-born workers remain a persistent feature of the UK labour market and a continuing concern for policy. Evidence on the role of firms in this trend has been limited due to lack of available data. However, if these pay gaps reflect barriers faced by immigrant workers in accessing relatively higher-paying employers, then policy responses focused on skills and progression may not fully address the issue.
This project aims to bridge this evidence gap by generating new UK evidence on how differences between employers, and movements between employers, contribute to the earnings gap between immigrant and UK-born workers, alongside measurable worker and job characteristics. The findings have the potential to inform immigration and labour market integration policy, by showing whether access to relatively higher-paying employers is an important part of the earnings gap.
Ross is a Lecturer at the University of Dundee.
View project details
This project aims to explore the following research questions:
- To what extent can the earnings gap between immigrant and UK-born workers be explained by their working for different firms, including firms that tend to pay more or less than other firms for similar workers doing similar jobs?
- How do immigrants’ earnings change as they spend more time in the UK labour market, compared with UK-born workers? To what extent are these changes related to moving between employers, including moves to firms that tend to pay higher or lower wages?
- Do immigrants’ earnings and movements between employers differ according to their country or region of origin, when they arrived in the UK, and how long they have been in the UK labour market?
The methodology used in this study:
- The study will first compare the earnings of immigrant and UK-born workers. Regression analysis, a statistical method that allows a comparison of workers while taking account of measurable differences between them, will be used. These may include their age, sex, occupation, industry, region and characteristics of their jobs. This will help examine how much of the earnings gap can be associated with these differences and how much remains unexplained by the information available.
- The role of employers will then be examined. Some employers tend to be associated with higher or lower pay, even when comparing similar workers doing similar jobs. These employer-related pay differences will be estimated by following workers over time. When workers move between employers, observing the same person under different employers helps compare how pay differs between them. Together, these worker movements allow comparisons across a wider network of employers. Using econometric methods, it can be estimated whether an employer in this network is associated with relatively higher or lower pay.
- Finally, the study will examine whether immigrant and UK-born workers tend to work for relatively higher or lower paying employers, and whether movements between employers are related to changes in their earnings over time. Statistical decomposition methods will help assess how much of the earnings gap is associated with measurable worker and job characteristics, how much is associated with the employers for which people work, and how much remains unexplained. The study will also examine whether these patterns differ by immigrants' country or region of origin, when they arrived in the UK, and how long they have been in the UK labour market.
Categories: Research using linked data, ADR UK Research Fellows, ADR England, Office for National Statistics, ADR UK Partnership, Social mobility & inclusion, Employment & the economy
