Minority status and family size: A comparison of explanations

Summary In this study, the family sizes of Chinese, Japanese and Filipino Americans are compared with those of whites, using data from the 1970 public use samples for California and Hawaii. The two hypotheses derived from the 'minority status' hypothesis are tested; the latter states that minorities experience tensions and anxiety which lead to lower fertility compared with native whites of Anglo-Saxon ancestry under certain conditions. We also examine the effect of assimilation in terms of variables known to affect fertility, and control for several age and acculturation variables. Analysis, based on a regression decomposition model, gives some support to the argument that the family size of minority groups differs from that of native whites because of incomplete assimilation and because independent variables affect fertility differently. However, since the independent effect of minority status per se is generally to raise fertility for Japanese and Chinese Americans, and lower it for Filipinos, we reject this version of the minority status hypothesis. Our general conclusion is that family size differentials in a pluralistic society may be part of a persisting pattern of sub-cultural differentiation, and do not necessarily reflect any 'tensions and anxiety' of minority status.     

Minority status and family size: A comparison of explanations

In this study, the family sizes of Chinese, Japanese and Filipino Americans are compared with those of whites, using data from the 1970 public use samples for California and Hawaii. The two hypotheses derived from the ‘minority status’ hypothesis are tested; the latter states that minorities experience tensions and anxiety which lead to lower fertility compared with native whites of Anglo-Saxon ancestry under certain conditions. We also examine the effect of assimilation in terms of variables known to affect fertility, and control for several age and acculturation variables.

Analysis, based on a regression decomposition model, gives some support to the argument that the family size of minority groups differs from that of native whites because of incomplete assimilation and because independent variables affect fertility differently. However, since the independent effect of minority status per se is generally to raise fertility for Japanese and Chinese Americans, and lower it for Filipinos, we reject this version of the minority status hypothesis. Our general conclusion is that family size differentials in a pluralistic society may be part of a persisting pattern of sub-cultural differentiation, and do not necessarily reflect any ‘tensions and anxiety’ of minority status.     

White-nonwhite differentials in occupational mobility among men in the United States, 1962–1972

Intercohort shifts between 1962 and 1972 in the occupation distributions of white and nonwhite men are analyzed and compared at ages 35-44, 45-54, and 55-64. Both white and nonwhite occupation distributions were upgraded over the decade, but among nonwhites the shifts away from the lowest-status occupations were expressed partly in increasing rates of absence from the labor force. There are indications of especially rapid shifts in the occupation distributions of nonwhite men at ages 35-44. Among whites and nonwhites intercohort shifts in the occupation distribution can be attributed primarily to changing patterns of movement from first full-time civilian jobs to current occupations, rather than to changing occupational origin distributions or patterns of movement to first jobs. The white and nonwhite occupation distributions did not show a clear pattern of convergence over the decade. They became less similar at ages 35-44 and more similar at older ages. White and nonwhite distributions were most likely to converge in those occupation groups where the share of whites was stable or declining, rather than in groups whose share of the occupation distribution was increasing. Later cohorts of nonwhites would have a much more favorable occupational distribution if they had enjoyed the mobility patterns of whites in earlier cohorts. In 1972, as in 1962, the inferior occupational chances of nonwhites are due primarily to their disadvantageous patterns of occupational mobility, rather than to impoverished social origins.     

Demographic and socioeconomic characteristics of Korean Americans in the United States in 1980

"Based on the analysis of 1980 [U.S. Census] Public-Use Microdata Samples, this article demonstrates that the Korean immigrant stream, particularly men, has been very selective even before the 1965 reform.... Despite the educational superiority and somewhat positive occupational position, Korean men in the U.S. are seriously disadvantaged in income regardless of nativity status. Korean Americans are not as successful as whites in translating their education into occupation and income; they are better educated for the same job, but experience a lower income return to the same education and the same occupation."     

Asian Americans: growth,change, and diversity

The 1980 US census counted 3.5 million Asian Americans, up from 1.4 million in 1970. Asian Americans made up just 1.5% of the total US population of 226.5 million as of April 1, 1980, but this was the 3rd largest racial or ethnic minority after blacks and Hispanics. Asians increased far more during the 1970s (141%) than blacks (17%) or Hispanics (39%). This Bulletin examines the characteristics of Asian Americans, how their numbers have grown, where they live, how different groups vary in age structure, childbearing, health, and longevity. It reports on the kinds of households Asian Americans form and how they fare with regard to education, occupation, and income. Asian Americans are now often perceived as the model minority. As a whole, they are better educated, occupy higher rungs on the occupational ladder, and earn more than the general US population and even white Americans. This Bulletin presents the 1st comprehensive look at many important facts about Asian Americans and how the groups differ. Special tabulations of data collected in the 1980 census are provided. The 1980 census data are the latest available to give a true picture at the national level of Asian Americans and the various groups among them. The Bulletin examines the current numbers of Asian Americans and how this population is defined. The major Asian American groups are Chinese (21%), Filipinos (20%), Japanese (15%), Vietnamese (21%), Koreans (11%), and Asian Indians (10%). Except for the latest-arrived Vietnamese, the fertility of the 6 groups is lower than the white average. The following areas are also discussed: mortality and health; families and households; education; Asian youth; employment; income and poverty; and future prospects.     

Estimates of coverage of the population by sex,race, and age in the 1970 census

Several estimates of total net underenumeration and of net census errors by sex, race (white, Negro-and-other-races, Negro), and age (five-year groups) in the 1960 and 1970 Censuses, for the total population of the United States, derived by the methods of demographic analysis, are presented. The different data, procedures, and assumptions employed in developing the various estimates are described briefly, and the findings are then discussed in terms of a”preferred” set of estimates. The preferred set of estimates of corrected population for 1970 combines estimates for persons under age 35 based directly on birth, death, and migration statistics, estimates for females aged 35 to 64 based on the Coale-Zelnik estimates (white) for 1950 or the Coale-Rives estimates (Negro) for 1960, estimates for males aged 35 to 64 based on the use of expected sex ratios, and estimates for the population 65 and over based on”Medicare” enrollments and expected sex ratios. These estimates indicate an overall net underenumeration of 5.3 million persons or 2.5 percent in 1970, as compared with 5.1 million or 2.7 percent in 1960, and a net underenumeration of 1.9 percent for whites and of 7.7 percent for Negroes in 1970, as compared with 2.0 percent and 8.0 percent, respectively, in 1960. As in 1960, undercoverage in 1970 was greatest for Negro males (9.9 percent); net error rates exceeded 12 percent in each age group 20 to 49 and reached 17 to 19 percent at ages 25 to 44. All sex-race groups showed marked increases between 1960 and 1970 for children under ten and marked declines at ages ten to 24. Equally reliable estimates of population coverage cannot be prepared for states and smaller geographic units or for the population of Spanish ancestry.     

Racial intermarriage pairings

Most studies of racial intermarriage rely on the prevalence of intermarriage to measure the strength of group boundaries, without scrutinizing the nature of intermarriage pairings. Examination of intermarried couples' characteristics reveals (1) that intermarriages and endogamous marriages follow different patterns, and (2) that intermarriage pairings for some groups reflect a generalized racial status hierarchy. According to evidence from the 1990 U.S. Census PUMS, patterns in blacks' and Mexican Americans' marriages with whites suggest that a generalized racial status hierarchy disadvantages members of these minority groups. For marriages between Japanese Americans and whites, however, crossing the group boundary does not affect couples' characteristics.     

The 1960s: A decade of progress for blacks?

Between 1960 and 1970 blacks, as well as whites, improved their socioeconomic status. Among both races, educational attainment increased, the occupational distribution was upgraded, and real purchasing power rose markedly. In almost every comparison, the gains were somewhat greater among blacks than among whites and thus most indicators of racial differentiation declined. Nevertheless, the changes of this decade failed to eliminate racial differences with regard to socioeconomic status. In all comparisons, except for the income of certain groups of women, blacks were at a disadvantage when compared to whites both at the start and at the end of this decade, and very large racial differences remain. Further socioeconomic progress by blacks during the 1970s will probably not eliminate racial differences. The article concludes by relating the socioeconomic trends to such other aspects of race relations as integration, governmental policy, and the attitudes of whites and blacks.     

The changing impact of white migration on the population compositions of origin and destination metropolitan areas

Increased migration to the sunbelt and the metropolitan-nonmetropolitan "turnaround" represent departures from long-standing redistribution trends. Although these patterns have been examined from a number of perspectives, their consequences for individual metropolitan areas have not yet been brought to light. In the present study, stream-disaggregated data for the late 1950s and late 1960s are employed to assess the impact of recent migration on the sizes and compositions of white populations in thirty-one large metropolitan areas. Most large northern SMSAs have been experiencing the "new" migration patterns since the late 1950s. They have incurred net out-movements of whites to both metropolitan and nonmetropolitan areas. In their exchanges with nonmetropolitan areas, however, they have managed to retain greater numbers of college graduates and professional workers. Southern and western SMSAs did not sustain losses to nonmetropolitan areas during either period. They did appear to gain both total and high status population as a result of interregional metropolitan redistribution.     

The residential segregation of occupational groups in central cities and suburbs

The impression of journalists and social critics in the 1950’s that post-war suburbia was uniformly middle-class has been generally rejected by social scientists, but there is a persisting belief in a high degree of residential segregation by social level in suburbia and in a high degree of socio-economic homogeneity within suburban neighborhoods. A comparison of eight central cities with their suburban zones in 1950 and in 1960 revealed, for both dates, (a) small differences in occupational distributions between the central cities and the suburban zones and (b) generally higher Index of Residential Dissimilarity values for pairs of occupational groups in the central cities. These findings indicate that suburban neighborhoods, at least in the eight suburban zones studied, were little, if any, more occupationally homogeneous than the central city neighborhoods. This suggests that the belief in homogeneous suburban neighborhoods should be added to the growing list of discredited “myths of suburbia. ”     

Child-spacing differentials for white and non-white couples according to educational level of attainment for the 1/1000 sample of the United States population in 1960

Abstract Despite previous research on the relationship between husband's or wife's level of educational attainment and childbearing and child spacing, relatively few data exist on couples' combined educational attainment which compares whites and non-whites. Further, to date a systematic exploration of available information contained on the 1/1,000 sample of the United States population in 1960 has not been undertaken. This paper utilizes these data and investigates the time intervals between marriage and first birth and between subsequent events to determine what relationships exist between parity and child spacing for white and non-white couples by level of educational attainment.     

Breaking the racial barriers: Variations in interracial marriage between 1980 and 1990

Using PUMS data from the 1980 and the 1990 U.S. Census, I apply log-linear models to examine interracial marriage among whites, African Americans, Hispanics, and Asian Americans. Rarely, but increasingly between 1980 and 1990, interracial marriage of whites occurs most frequently with Asian Americans, followed by Hispanics, and then by African Americans. Interracial marriage tends to be educationally homogamous and the odds of interracial marriage increase with couples ’ educational attainment. Among interracially married couples with different educational attainments, both men and women from lower status racial groups but with high education levels tend to marry spouses from a higher status racial group with low education levels     

Race,wages, and assimilation among Cuban immigrants

This study uses data from the 1980 and 1990 Census and the 1994–2000 Current Population Survey to examine the determinants of earnings among male Cuban immigrants in the U.S. by race. Nonwhite Cuban immigrants earn about 15 percent less than whites, on average. Much of the racial wage gap is due to differences in educational attainment, age at migration, and years in the U.S., but the gap remains at almost 4 percent after controlling for such factors. Nonwhite Cuban immigrants also have lower returns to education than whites. A comparison to white, non-Hispanic U.S. natives indicates that nonwhite Cubans not only earn less initially than white Cubans on arrival in the U.S., but also do not significantly close the racial earnings gap over time.     

Occupational Stratification of Hispanics,Whites, and Blacks in Southern Rural Destinations: A Quantitative Analysis

Since the 1990s, many rural communities in the Southern US have experienced an unprecedented influx of Latino migrants. Some research undertaken on such “new Hispanic destinations” suggests that the newcomers tend to assume low-status jobs shunned by non-Hispanic residents and thus form a segmented labor market, but other work indicates that they heavily compete with natives (particularly African Americans) for less-skilled positions. Drawing on data from the 2000 census and 2009–2011 American Community Survey, this paper examines patterns of occupational stratification between Latino, white, and black men in the rural South to identify whether Hispanic economic relations in the area are better characterized by segmentation or competition. Specifically, occupational dissimilarity indexes and status scores are calculated to map the groups’ relative economic positions in the rural portions of five Southeastern states home to fast-growing nonmetro Latino populations: Alabama, Arkansas, Georgia, North Carolina, and South Carolina. Consistent with the segmentation hypothesis, the results reveal that Latinos are highly occupationally dissimilar from non-Hispanic whites and blacks and rank significantly below both in mean occupational status. Standardization of the stratification measures shows that Hispanics’ labor market isolation and disadvantage can be substantially accounted for by their lower average levels of human capital and US citizenship.     

Reproductive ideals and educational attainment among white Americans, 1943-1960

Abstract Would the persistent inverse relation between educational attainment and family size in the United States be removed if actual fertility were equal to ideal? Data on ideal family size from 10 national surveys among white Americans of both sexes (from 1943 to 1960) show that gradeschool level respondents have higher ideals than the more educated even when age, religious affiliation, and farm residence are used as controls. Comparison of these ideals with the actual family size or ever-fertile women in the United States indicates that, on the average, the actual family size of all major educational groups falls below the ideal, but the college-educated are furthest from their ideal. If this group lessened the gap between actual and ideal family size, the educational differential in fertility would decrease, but at the price of increasing the rate of population growth.     

Racial and Ethnic Disparities in Health Insurance Coverage: Dynamics of Gaining and Losing Coverage Over the Life-Course

Health insurance coverage varies substantially between racial and ethnic groups in the United States. Compared to non-Hispanic whites, African Americans and people of Hispanic origin had persistently lower insurance coverage rates at all ages. This article describes age- and group-specific dynamics of insurance gain and loss that contribute to inequalities found in traditional cross-sectional studies. It uses the longitudinal 2008 Panel of the Survey of Income and Program Participation (N = 114,345) to describe age-specific patterns of disparity prior to the Affordable Care Act (ACA). A formal decomposition on increment–decrement life tables of insurance gain and loss shows that coverage disparities are predominately driven by minority groups’ greater propensity to lose the insurance that they already have. Uninsured African Americans were faster to gain insurance compared to non-Hispanic whites, but their high rates of insurance loss more than negated this advantage. Disparities from greater rates of loss among minority groups emerge rapidly at the end of childhood and persist throughout adulthood. This is especially true for African Americans and Hispanics, and their relative disadvantages again heighten in their 40s and 50s.     

The Determinants of Neighborhood Satisfaction: Racial Proxy Revisited

Understanding the factors that drive individuals’ residential preferences is a critical issue in the study of racial segregation. An important debate within this field is whether individuals—especially whites—prefer to live in predominantly white neighborhoods because they wish to avoid the social problems that may be more likely to occur in predominantly black neighborhoods (i.e., the racial proxy hypothesis) or because of racial factors that go beyond these social class–related characteristics. Through a multilevel analysis of data from the 2004–2005 Chicago Area Study and several administrative sources, we assess the extent to which the racial proxy hypothesis describes neighborhood satisfaction among whites, African Americans, and Latinos living across a broad range of neighborhood contexts. The racial proxy perspective applies weakly to whites’ satisfaction: whites report less satisfaction in neighborhoods with more minority residents, and only some of their dissatisfaction can be attributed to local social characteristics. The racial proxy hypothesis applies more strongly to blacks’ and Latinos’ satisfaction. In some cases, especially for Latinos, higher levels of satisfaction in integrated neighborhoods can largely be attributed to the fact that these places have better socioeconomic conditions and fewer social problems than predominantly minority communities. At the same time, effects of racial/ethnic composition persist in unique and somewhat divergent ways for blacks and Latinos, supporting the assertion that racial composition matters, above and beyond its relation to social class. Taken together, these findings suggest that individuals balance both socioeconomic and race-related concerns in their residential preferences.     

Military Veterans and Neighborhood Racial Integration: VA Mortgage Lending Across Three Eras

The military has long been seen as an avenue for increasing racial equality for minorities, especially black Americans. In this article, we examine to what extent military veterans also experience residential integration by looking at neighborhood residential outcomes for black and white men utilizing the popular Veterans Affairs (VA) loan program to purchase a home. We draw on data from the Home Mortgage Disclosure Act (HMDA) to examine residential integration among white and black veteran homebuyers compared to homebuyers utilizing conventional loans over three major lending eras: 1990s, 2000–2007, and 2008–2015. By 2015, a quarter of all home purchase mortgages loans to black men were VA loans even though veterans made up only a tenth of the adult black male population. In our multivariate analyses, we uncover a sizeable combined swing toward neighborhood minority-white integration, 14.4% points, among black and white veterans who use VA loans. Compared to those with conventional loans, black veterans live in neighborhoods with 10% points fewer minorities and, white veterans, 4.4% points fewer whites. Our results illustrate how racial integration in the US military has the potential to foster lasting housing integration among veterans.     

Educational attainment as a selective factor in marital status transitions in the United States

Data on marital status from the 1940, 1950, and 1960 censuses of the United States are organized to show (1) trends in percentages of men and women who were single, by age and education (grades of school completed); (2) relative education levels of husbands and wives for selected groups of couples in 1940 and I960 with comparisons for the two years; and (3) education levels of women in 1950 by marital status, controlling for age and year of entry into the 1950 marital status. The rate at which single persons married for the first time increased markedly during the decade of the 1940's but much less in the next decade. The 1940's increases occurred for both sexes at all educational levels and at all ages except the oldest. However, the rate of increase was greatest for both sexes in the ages from about 20 to 34 for women and 22 to S4for men (modal age for first marriage is 18 for women and 21 for men). The distribution of percents single by age was about the same in all three censuses for persons with elementary schooling.A trend toward smaller proportions of the single, both men and women, among young persons with college education continued for the entire twenty-year period, despite the lack of such a trend in the 1950's at other age and education levels. However, the available data on education of first-married husbands and wives indicate that the ratio of college-educated husbands to college-educated wives was higher in 1960 than in 1940. Part of the explanation may lie in the relatively high proportions of college-educated women found in the marital statuses "divorced" and "married more than once" in the 1950 Census, particularly at the younger ages and shorter durations; but the data are not adequate for a very satisfactory explanation. For the younger first-married for whom education of partners was cross-tabulated in 1940 and 1960, the proportions of college-educated persons were so much higher in 1960 than in 1940 that the proportions also increased of both husbands and wives at all educational levels who were married to college-educated partners. There was a marked decline in proportions of couples with only elementary schooling.Finally, based on data from the 1950 Census for women (15-59 years of age), the separated group included more with only elementary schooling, as did the widowed. Those remaining single and those married once usually included the highest proportions of college-educated women.