Posted on 01/28/2007 4:43:35 AM PST by Pharmboy
NASHVILLE, Jan. 27 (AP) — Light-skinned immigrants in the United States make more money on average than those with darker complexions, and the chief reason appears to be discrimination, a researcher says.
The scholar, Joni Hersch, a professor of law and economics at Vanderbilt University, looked at a government survey of 2,084 legal immigrants to the United States from around the world and found that those with the lightest skin earned an average of 8 percent to 15 percent more than similar immigrants with much darker skin.
“On average,” Dr. Hersch said, “being one shade lighter has about the same effect as having an additional year of education.”
The study also found that taller immigrants earned more than shorter ones, with an extra inch of height associated with a 1 percent increase in income.
Other researchers said the findings were consistent...and pointed to a skin-tone prejudice that went beyond race.
Dr. Hersch took into consideration other factors that could affect wages, like English-language proficiency, education, occupation, race or country of origin, and found that skin tone still seemed to make a difference in earnings. That meant that if two similar immigrants from Bangladesh, for example, came to the United States at the same time, with the same occupation and ability to speak English, the lighter-skinned one would make more money on average.
“I thought that once we controlled for race and nationality, I expected the difference to go away,” Dr. Hersch said, “but even with people from the same country, the same race, skin color really matters.”
Although many cultures show a bias toward lighter skin, she said her analysis showed that the skin-color advantage was not based on preferential treatment for light-skinned people in their country of origin. The bias, she said, occurs in the United States.
(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...
Considering the source of this article, this is the most predictable line in the whole piece.
"Study of Immigrants Links Lighter Skin and Higher Income"
- The wrong question. More properly put the headline should read: "Study of Immigrants Links Lighter Skin and Higher Education."
Didn't "The Bell Curve" demonstrate an intellect difference correlated with skin color? Perhaps Prof. Hersch should have put IQ into the parameter mix, or not - too bland, no headlines! Well Professor, I did not see IQ as a factor in your list of considerations, what about that? Forgive my lack of PCness.
Isn't that because the "darker skinned" ones will only do jobs that we lazy, selfish, spoiled Americans won't do? I believe that means the low=paying ones.
But that wouldn't suit their needs. At all times, the NYT must spin to The Victims of this world aka "those dark-skinned people," who somehow seem to manage to get along without reading the NYT.
Were Asian Indians included in this "survey" ? Are Chineese and Koreans considered "lighter" than Hispanics? How does the doctor explain the success of these ethnic groups?
What metric did the doctor use to judge skin pimentation? Was it the "brown paper bag test".
I note the doctor only studied "legal" immigrants surely if he studied "undocumented immigrants" the results would be much differant..
The professor is a fraud. Unless he can quantify my supposition of his complete and total failure here he should be ridiculed and dismissed.
"ASSOCIATED PRESS via NY Times" was as far as I got.
LOL! But we must monitor the enemy...
To have any validity some sort of testing should occur, english fluency, math and verbal skills. Also if all the dark skinned ones could not write and light skinned ones could, then the study would not be valid. I believe there is some sort of factor, like ability or learning, or willingness to work that is occurring here.
This just makes sense. We're such a racist bunch. I know I won't go to a 7-11 if the Indians are darker. I like fair complexion to go with my BIg-Gulp. This guy has us all figured out. I guess we better go back to the super-secret evil (straight, white, and Christian) racist American enclave and formulate a new diabolical scheme.
Check out the second paragraph from the bottom.
I've travelled extensively and visited factories in Malaysia, Thailand, China, eastern and western Europe, Honduras and Nicaragua. I have co-workers who have been in a number of South American countries. The observation? Without fail, the lightest skin people are the bosses, the darkest skin people are mucking the sewage.
One merely need look at TV originating from any country. The talking heads, the actors, etc. almost exclusively lily white, even in countries where the people are quite brown or even dark black. There are exceptions, but they are exceptions, not the rule.
The fact is that discrimination by skin tone is universal. The ruling class of virtually every society is, in fact, lighter than the rest of the population. That goes for Central Africa as much as for anywhere else. When a darker usurper seizes the seat of power, he proceeds to marry his progeny off to the lighter skinned people among his subjects or to lighter skinned spouses in neighboring realms.It happens among the elites in the subpopulations, too. The wealthier families try to insure that their spawn are mated with lighter skinned spouses. It is less among the economically developed populations where impetuous youth are able to make their own choices more readily but it does not go away because the youth still understand sub- if not wholly consciously that a lighter mate will meet with more approval from family than a darker even if the subject is never mentioned.It will not change until the government controls ALL matches and assigns spouses or casual impregnations by lottery or by some mathematical system to assure random mating or perhaps a systematic preferred result.
I wonder if the trial lawyers funded Joni's study??
Here's the paragraph that mewzilla was referring to in his post:
Hersch said her findings, which will be presented at the annual meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science next month in San Francisco, could support discrimination lawsuits based not on race, but on color.
Now why do you suppose the NYT would wanna leave out the bit about the lawsuits...
Hmmmmmmm.....
Snort.
:)
This issue covers academia, anthropology, society and the media and therefore I thought I would ping this random non-ping list.
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