Follow up to Model-Minority Group

Breaking Down Borders: Korea ^ | Sept. 22nd, 2009 | Han

[joey703]

And, I've found the data. It's actually a report from the U.S. Census Bureau entitled, "We the People: Asians in the United States" (the full file can be found here and the link is also in the Selected Articles part as you scroll down on your left hand side). I've taken a photo of the graph and circled the relevant portion in red. While definitely, not the poorest, it does show that Korean-Americans are the poorest among Northeast Asians and actually have a lower median income than that of all American households, which stands in stark contrast with the fact that the median of Asian-Americans stands much higher than that of all American housholds. Of course, I'm not getting into why this is the case as this doesn't separate the different groupings according to the date of arrival and the like. Specifically, the report says:

[marron]

A lot are coming here as small businessmen.

My expectation is that they will not stay down for long; they work hard and will over time prosper.

The folks I have known are good people. Solid. Fearless.

[fours]

I’d say it’s not that useful to try and draw conclusions about various ethnicities by using statistics on the different nationalities of people who have immigrated to the US. Immigrants come here to work hard and follow their dreams — I guess you could say the Confucian work ethic has something to do with it, but who knows.

It’s not like back in India/Pakistan/Korea/China everyone has their own store or restaurant, but if you used statistics based on immigrants in the US you might think so. It’s just a good business to be in if you’re an immigrant. Another example: foreign-born African immigrants have on average much higher incomes and educational levels than African-Americans.

Foreign-born demographic profiles by nation from the 2000 Census:
http://www.census.gov/population/www/socdemo/foreign/STP-159-2000tl.html

Also:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_foreign_born_per_capita_income
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/U.S._per_capita_income_by_ancestry

Interesting statistics:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/African_immigration_to_the_United_States

[joey703]

I agree; if drawing any conclusions from data divided according to such "loose" groupings, then definitely care should be exercised if/when you're drawing up conclusions.

It seems like such a touchy subject though.

[joey703]

At the same time, I think what you said also, points at another controversial issue — the achievement gap between native born African-Americans and immigrant African-Americans.

[BobbyT]

Well there’s that, and the fact that escaping grinding socialist poverty tends to make someone appreciate the freedoms here and motivated to take advantage of it.

Take any immigrant group from a country with a thug government, vs. any complacent group here, especially one that’s been told it’s “entitled” and made dependent on handouts.

Asian immigrants vs. Americans as a whole.
African immigrants vs. inner city blacks.
Cubans escapees vs. illegal Mexican aliens.

[joey703]

there’s other inherent factors as well; such as how much money they come with or how much education they have. I met a suprisingly large number of African - immigrant college graduates that have become taxi drivers in San Francisco...