Polish Migrant Workers within the UK Hospitality Industry Literature review

Polish Migrant Workers within the UK Hospitality Industry - Literature review Example (Dobson, 2009). Migration to a new country is often a tough decision and is based upon certain factors such as the social integration with other sections of the society, the overall economic prospects of finding earning opportunities as well as the security of the residence. (Ruhs & Anderson, 2007). These factors effectively determine whether any country or government is more open to the international immigrant workers or not and therefore all subsequent decisions by the mobile international labor force depend on such factors. Within the context of UK, this has been relatively more favorable for the immigrants until recently when economic hardships have forced the government to take steps to curb the immigrations and restrict the flow of economic workers from outside the EU zone. UK’s hospitality sector is one of the growing sectors in the country owing to the increasing number of tourists flowing into the country. It was because of this reason that most of the polish workers who came before 2006 mainly were inducted in different sectors including hospitality sector. Some estimates suggest that almost 22% of the Polish workers who came to the country before 2006 were employed in the hospitality sector thus making it one of the biggest sectors in the economy to have polish immigrant workers. Like all international workers, they also however, faced the different issues such as low wage, discrimination at the work as well as other work related issues which potentially can hamper their long term prospects. Cultural diversity is another important issue which has been highlighted in the existing literature in terms of the employment of the Polish workers in the hospitality sector of UK. This literature review will therefore present a comprehensive analysis of the existing literature on the polish workers in UK Hospitality sector. Hospitality Sector in UK In UK, Hospitality sector is defined along with leisure, travel and tourism sections of the industry also. It is because of this reason that the overall number of businesses coming under the sector is relatively large and diverse including hotels, pubs and night clubs, restaurants, events, membership services, gambling and visitor attractions. Hospitality sector in the country is one of the largest employers in the country with almost 400,000 workers working in the core hospitality sector. A closer review of the existing data would suggest that most of the workers in the hospitality sector are females whereas almost 8% of the workforce belongs to ethnic minority or the blacks. It is also important to note that the ratio of the full time and part time workers in the industry is almost same with 57% of the workers working on part time basis. (People 1st, 2009) The age profile of the workers working in this industry is really diversified however, majority of the workers are aged with significant portion of the workers over the age of 30. Further, it is also important to note that the most o f the workers in this industry are employed in the kitchen and catering related activities followed by chefs and cooks. Bar staff is the third largest group of employees working in this segment of the industry thus suggesting the overall diversity of the sector and the people working in the sector. (People 1st, 2009) It is also important to note that the overall ownership patterns in the industry in UK are also changing. Traditionally hospitality sector