Research Sparse about Less Educated Asian American Men in the Labor Market

I got into a discussion/argument about labor market discrimination against Asian American men in the working class.

Highlights:

[N]ative-born Asian Americans … income is 8 percent lower than whites.
Asian American men who drop out of high school earn substantially less than comparable whites at the low end of the earnings distribution.
[During the early part of the COVID-19 pandemic] 83 percent of Asian Americans who have a high school degree or lower… filed for unemployment insurance claims in California in comparison to 37 percent of the rest of California’s workforce.

I was told that we face discrimination in getting into customer-facing jobs, and I wasn’t sure if that was the case. I admitted that I didn’t think there was any discrimination (I actually did, but not that much, but it seemed like my debate partner wanted me to take a more adversarial position). Since I was being accused of having other positions I didn’t, like saying Asians had the lowest unemployment, I figured “why fight it.”

I decided to do a cursory search for papers related to the subject, specifically focused on Asian American men. There really isn’t much out there.

To get copies of the papers, you should be able to request one from the author, via email. JSTOR also offers 100 free reads per month.

Induct Leslie Kong into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame!

News release: Asian American Men Face Discrimination in Job Market

Author’s publication page: ChangHwan Kim

“…[N]ative-born Asian Americans — who were born in the U.S. and speak English perfectly — their income is 8 percent lower than whites after controlling for their college majors, their places of residence and their level of education”

Preview: The Earnings of Less Educated Asian American Men: Educational Selectivity and the Model Minority Image

Author’s publication page: ChangHwan Kim

“The results indicate that Asian American men who drop out of high school earn substantially less than comparable whites at the low end of the earnings distribution. This pattern of racial differentials seems to be consistent with the “destructive myth” perspective and inconsistent with the alternative explanation of negative educational selectivity.”

Blog post: Asian Employment Discrimination

“While [15%] of California’s population consists of Asian Americans, a report from UCLA displayed that 83 percent of Asian Americans who have a high school degree or lower have filed for unemployment insurance claims in California in comparison to 37 percent of the rest of California’s workforce. It is apparent that racializing the coronavirus has far-reaching societal consequences.”

Overall, it looks like research about Asian American men, specifically, is sparse. Perhaps stats can be found in papers about Asian American women’s employment, or men’s employment.