How Asian Americans Fare in the Labor Market: The Intersection of Education, Gender, and Ethnicity

Studies of Asian Americans in the labor market point to significant variations in experiences by educational attainment, gender, and ethnicity, but few studies attend to the intersections of these characteristics in yielding disparate patterns of earnings. Using data from the American Community Survey 2019 five-year file, we compare the earnings of 1.5 generation and native-born prime working-age Asian Americans from the five largest ethnic groups (Chinese, Filipinos, Indians, Koreans, and Vietnamese) with the earnings of White Americans, focusing on the role of labor supply and occupations in explaining differences in earnings. At baseline, we find no consistent earnings advantage for Asian Americans. Asian American men across levels of education typically work less and in different types of occupations compared to White men. These patterns contribute substantively to differences in earnings among men. In contrast, Asian American women do not differ markedly from White women in labor supply, though college-educated Asian American women do tend to work in different occupations, which contributes to a modest earnings advantage. Findings have implications for understanding the racialized, classed, and gendered experiences of Asian Americans in the labor market.