Asian-Americans, including Indian-Americans, fared better than other racial groups during the Great Recession of 2009 when almost eight lakh Americans lost their jobs in a month, according to a new official study.
The unemployment rate for the Asian Americans that includes Indian-Americans was more than doubled from 3.2 per cent in 2007 to 7.5 per cent in 2010, the study titled 'The Economic Status of Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders in the Wake of the Great Recession' said.
This study by the US Department of Labour also states that for the most part, as a group, AAPI (Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders) workers have had more favourable economic outcomes than workers in any other racial group.
The AAPI community includes those who descend from (or are themselves foreign born in) a broad set of countries in East Asia, Southeast Asia, South Asia, and the Pacific Islands and immigrated to the United States for various reasons.
They had the highest labour force participation rate at 64.9 per cent and the lowest unemployment rate at 5.6 per cent.
Together, workers in AAPI communities also had the highest weekly median earnings (USD 987)of all the major race and ethnic groups, it said.
Although there is a great deal of variation in these economic outcomes across ethnic groups, disparities that have their roots in different immigration stories and many other factors, the report stated.
Within the group, the Japanese have the lowest unemployment rate at 3.3 per cent followed by Indians and Chinese at 4.4 per cent and Vietnamese at 5 per cent, the report said.
The study found that among the Asian-Americans community, Indian (16 weeks) and Korean (15 weeks) unemployed workers experienced the shortest average durations of unemployment, whereas Vietnamese workers had the longest (27 weeks).
Indian, Japanese and Chinese Americans have the highest wages, making 32, 24, and 13 per cent more than the white population respectively.
But if individuals with the same level of education are compared, the gaps for Indian, Japanese, and Chinese workers shrink dramatically to 10, 8, and 1 per cent, respectively, the study found.
Thus for these ethnic groups, education explains most of the wage differences, since on average Indian, Japanese, and Chinese workers have higher levels of education than the rest of the labour force.
As the study said that within Asian ethnic subgroups, 76.1 per cent of Indian, 58.7 per cent of Korean, and 56.8 per cent of Chinese individuals have a bachelor's degree or higher.
