Unequal Access to a Medical Career: Socioeconomic Disparities Persist in the UK Doctor Workforce
A recent study analyzing data from the UK Office for National Statistics Labor Force Survey reveals important socioeconomic inequalities in who becomes a doctor in the United Kingdom. The research, encompassing data from over 358,000 working adults aged 23 and over collected between 2014 and 2024, highlights a clear link between a respondent’s background at age 14 and their current occupation as a doctor.
The study found that only around 1% of respondents were currently employed as doctors. However, this small percentage exhibited a strikingly different socioeconomic profile compared to other professionals. Nearly 70% of doctors surveyed came from professional backgrounds, a stark contrast to the 32% observed in other occupations. Conversely, doctors were significantly less likely to originate from working-class families (13% vs. 43%).
The data demonstrates a substantial advantage for those from privileged backgrounds. Individuals with professional parents were three to six times more likely to enter the medical profession than those from intermediate or working-class families. Furthermore, growing up in a household were the main earner was a doctor dramatically increased the likelihood of becoming one – respondents with a doctor parent were 15 times more likely to be doctors themselves, and between 3 and 100 times more likely than those without.
Conversely, individuals whose parents worked in occupations like cleaning, home care, security, transportation (taxi, bus, truck driving), or warehousing were significantly underrepresented in the medical field, with probabilities of becoming a doctor ranging from 1 in 500 to 1 in 1500.
Researchers adjusted for factors like survey year, age 18, sex, country of birth, and ethnicity, finding that socioeconomic background remained the primary driver of these disparities. Importantly, these inequalities have remained remarkably stable over decades, persisting among those who reached adulthood between the 1960s and the 2000s, with only a slight indication of increasing disparity between 2010 and 2018.
The study authors emphasize that,as an observational study,it cannot definitively prove cause and effect. They also acknowledge the limited representation of doctors (1-2% of the total workforce) within the survey data. Though, they conclude that the medical workforce is demonstrably unrepresentative of the broader UK population in terms of socioeconomic background, mirroring similar observations within medical school admissions over the past 60 years.
The researchers highlight a critical gap in understanding: the potential impact of this socioeconomic imbalance on the quality of patient care. They advocate for the systematic collection of doctors’ socioeconomic backgrounds through national databases like those maintained by the UK General medical Council or NHS England, which already collect data on protected characteristics under the UK Equality Act. This data,they argue,is crucial for future research and addressing this persistent inequality within the medical profession.
Source: Cheetham, N. J., et al. (2025). Socioeconomic diversity of doctors in the United Kingdom: a cross-sectional study of 10 years of Labour Force Survey social mobility data. BMJ Open. doi.org/10.1136/bmjopen-2024-097178
