아시아계 미국인의 사회경제적 지위: 미국 출생 세대를 중심으로

Socioeconomic Status of Asian-Americans: focusing on US-born generations

This paper surveys the socioeconomic achievements of US-born Asian Americans and related controversies. The first issue concerns whether US-born Asian Americans are rewarded appropriately for the efforts they put in. They don’t suffer pecuniary disadvantage in the labor markets, but still make limited success in advancing in the areas where social and cultural capital prevails in status attainment. The second issue concerns whether Asian American’s success fits with the stereotype of “Model Minority” and the ideology of “American Dream.” Since the US-born Asian Americans could obtain high academic achievement and good occupations by dint of their parent’s middle class background in their origin countries, the stereotype and the ideology don’t fit with their experiences. The third issue concerns the internal diversity and disparity among Asian Americans. The wide diversity and disparity within and between ethnic groups have shrunk in US-born generations compared to their parents. The paper projects that the US-born Asian Americans will keep advancing into the areas where they have been sparsely represented so far despite a substantial pocket of poor people among them.