Stark Contrasts Found Among Asian Americans

The striking success of Asian Americans who trace their heritage to India contrasted with data showing struggles among Cambodian, Laotian and Hmong immigrants. Those three groups reported continued significant poverty rates, low job skills and limited English-language ability since their flight from war and political turmoil.

The report, "We the People: Asians in the United States," was based on 2000 census data and underscored the enormous socioeconomic diversity among the nation's 10 million Asian Americans, more than one third of whom live in California, the state with their largest population.

Asian Americans increased from 6.9 million, or 2.8% of the U.S. population, in 1990 to 10.2 million, or 3.6%, in 2000. Including mixed-race Asian Americans, counted by the census for the first time in 2000, the population was 11.9 million, or 4.2%.

"It is a community of contrasts," said Kimiko Kelly, research analyst with the Asian Pacific American Legal Center in Los Angeles. "Asian Americans are seen as a model minority who are not suffering from barriers to education or progress. But if you look closely, you see a community that covers the whole spectrum, from wealthy to very poor."

She said the growing diversity of the community, which was mainly Chinese, Japanese and Filipinos until 1965 immigration reforms were instituted, has multiplied the challenges facing service organizations such as hers. Translators for health clinics and courts are among the pressing needs, she said.

The contrasts are detailed in the report, which provides data on such items as age, marital status, citizenship, language, education, earnings, poverty rates, occupation and home ownership among 11 Asian American groups.

Median family income, for instance, ranged from $70,849 for Japanese and $70,708 for Asian Indians to about half that for Cambodians and Hmong. Indian men showed the highest full-time earnings, $51,900, about double the figure for Hmong men.

About 64% of Asian Indians held a bachelor's degree or more, the highest rate, compared with 7.7% for Laotians and 7.5% for Hmong, the lowest. More than three-fourths of Indians and Filipinos spoke fluent English, twice the rate for Vietnamese.