Survey: 43% of gay men have faced homophobia by colleagues

PinkNews logo surrounded by illustrated images including a rainbow, unicorn, PN sign and pride flag.

A survey by gay dating website Gaydar shows 26% of gay men are not open about their sexuality at work and 43% have faced homophobia by colleagues.

The ā€œGay in the Workplaceā€ study of over 4,500 members ofĀ Gaydar.net also surveyed views about professions.

Education is the most common sector among Gaydar respondents, with over 9% working as teachers, professors and lecturers. 1% were engineers, 1% analysts, 1% police officers and 0.2% scientists.

Despite the average salary in the UK being Ā£26,000, 18% of respondents revealed that their earnings are Ā£50,000 or more, with 4% in the Ā£100,000 or above pay bracket.Ā A further 27% are in the Ā£31-49,000 bracket.

The top gay earners areĀ LondonĀ based, with almost one in four (23%) earning Ā£50 – Ā£100,000 a year, and 7% having an annual salary of Ā£100,000 or above.

London is also the city with the least amount of low paid gay employeesĀ – only 7% are earning under Ā£16,000 while 11% earn between Ā£17,000 and Ā£24,000.

Plymouth is ranked as having the lowest paid gay professionals, with 21% earning under Ā£16,000 and 18% earning Ā£17-24,000.

The highest paying jobs among gay men in the UK ā€“ where there annual salary is Ā£100,000 ā€“Ā are directors (25%), lawyers and solicitors (23%) and consultants (14%), while the lowest paid roles are shop workers (70%), bar staff (62%) and chefs (45%), all earning under Ā£16,000.

Respondents considered the top three stereotypically gay professions to be hairdressers (70%), air stewards (67%) and dancers (39%). However, results showed that less than 1% of Gaydar users actually work in these roles.

In August, a survey by Stonewall found that one in five gay employees have experienced verbal bullying from colleagues, customers or service users in the past five years. A quarter said they were ā€œnot at all openā€ to colleagues about their sexual orientation.