NCPA - Daily Policy Digest - Asian Immigrants Have Become Successful Entrepreneurs

NATIONAL CENTER FOR POLICY ANALYSIS
/ / / /

Asian Immigrants Have Become Successful Entrepreneurs

Showing the entrepreneurial spirit traditionally associated with immigrant populations, Asians have founded more businesses than any other minority group in the United States. During the vast wave of immigration in the past two decades, nearly 600,000 U.S. companies have been founded by Chinese, Asian-Indians, Pacific Islanders and other Asians, according to a USA Today analysis.

Asian businesses are bigger than other minority-owned enterprises -- with average annual revenues of $336,200, compared to $155,200 for Hispanic companies and $86,500 for black-owned firms.

That has helped make Asian households wealthier than other major immigrant groups, and white Americans in general -- with an annual median income of $55,521, their household income is higher than all others, including whites at $45,904.

Asians have high entrepreneurship rates, with 10,561 companies in the U.S. for every 100,000 Asian adults -- nearly twice the rate for Hispanics and more than three times the rate for blacks.

Observers attribute Asians' entrepreneurial success to higher education levels, as well as their ability to obtain financing from within their own community.

Twenty years ago, blacks were first in U.S. minority business ownership. Not anymore. Now, Hispanics are first, Asians second and blacks third.

Source: Jim Hopkins, "Asian Business Owners Gaining Clout," USA Today, February 27, 2002.

For Immigrant Profiles
http://www.ncpa.org/iss/imm

12770 Coit Rd., Suite 800 - Dallas, TX 75251-1339 - 972/386-6272 - Fax 972/386-0924
601 Pennsylvania Ave. NW, Suite 900 South Building - Washington, DC 20004 - 202/220-3082 - Fax 202/220-3096
Copyright © 2002 National Center for Policy Analysis - All rights reserved.