these trends are representative of the composition of the uk population, as reported in the 2011 census. ( a ) participation trends female participation in the workforce has been on a broadly upward trend in the uk. elsewhere across the g7, trends have been more disparate ( chart 1 ). based on oecd labour force statistics, uk rates of female participation are second only to canada across the g7, having recently overtaken the us. chart 1 : g7 female participation rates per cent canada france germany italy japan uk us sources : ons labour force survey, oecd labour force statistics and bank of england calculations. this paper does not aim to produce better estimates of the gender and ethnicity pay gaps than the official ones published by the ons. ashe data is the best source for estimating the overall gaps, but the lfs has a rich set of individual and job characteristics allowing the type of analysis showcased here. all speeches are available online at www. bankofengland. co. uk / speeches the increase in female participation has been accompanied by an opposite trend among the male population, which has fallen from 70 % to 65 % over the sample. in other words, the gender “ participation gap ” between males and females in the uk has fallen by around 10 percentage points over the past 25 years, though it remains positive at around 8 percentage points. the participation of ethnic minorities in the uk labour force has also been on an upward trend since the 1990s, reaching around 64 % in 2019. labour participation by the white population was, by contrast, on a slightly downward trend prior to the gfc, after which it has flattened off. that leaves participation rates for ethnic minorities today slightly above the levels of the white population. there have been some striking gender - related shifts in the pattern of work. the share of part - time employment among females has been declining, with a corresponding larger share of females working full - time. the opposite is true among males, with the share of men working part - time increasing by 5 percentage points over the sample. for ethnic minorities, part - time employment has steadily increased, with a pronounced pick up following the crisis. next, we look at three variables which are often used to capture aspects of “ human capital ” : the highest qualification achieved, the occupation of a person, and the sector in which they are employed. for illustrative purposes, we split the sample into four sub - groups – white men, white women, ethnic minority men,

appetites agreed by their boards. possible ways of achieving this include : introducing robust wording exclusions, offering explicit cover with additional premium and attaching specific limits to cover. finally, we have also been considering how we might respond to a large loss affecting many insurers that could change market conditions. we have worked closely with the industry and lloyd ’ s over the past few months following our consultation last year. turning to life insurance, a potential concern is that the shift towards direct investments might in future lead to a concentration of exposure to uk property. excluding unit - linked business, uk insurers ’ property - related exposures grew significantly over the course of 2016 to stand at 11 % of non - linked assets. the most rapid growth has been in mortgages and loans secured on property, particularly equity release mortgages. our analysis of insurers ’ equity release exposures suggests that a stress roughly aligned to the fpc ’ s banking system stress test ( a 30 % fall in house prices and 0 - 0. 5 % growth per annum thereafter ) could lead to industry - wide losses of £2 - 3 billion ( see table and chart below ). the prudent person principle in solvency ii is an important safeguard against concentration risk. it requires insurers to invest only in assets whose risks they can “ properly identify, measure, monitor, manage, control and report ”. moreover, assets must be “ properly diversified ” so as “ to avoid excessive reliance on any particular asset, issuer or group of undertakings or geographical area and excessive accumulation of risk in the portfolio as a whole ”. assets not admitted to trading on a regulated financial market are required to be kept to “ prudent ” levels. the illiquid direct investments i described earlier would typically fall into this category. later this year, we plan to set out in a supervisory statement our expectations of how uk insurers should invest their assets in accordance with the prudent person principle. these include losses as a result of both malicious acts ( eg cyber attack, infection of an it system with malicious code ) and non - malicious acts ( eg loss of data, accidental acts or omissions ) ; and involving both tangible and intangible assets. http : / / www. bankofengland. co. uk / pra / pages / publications / ss / 2017 / ss417. aspx from around £84 billion to nearly £99 billion. data