Ethnicity & Immigration - Asian And Pacific Islander Settlement Patterns4

Asians and Pacific Islanders (APIs) have relatively high concentration levels vis-à-vis whites in this sample of cities — nine with the lowest, and nine with the highest API population. Isolation, a measure of segregation, was low in metro areas with small populations and variable in metro areas where APIs have the largest relative share of population. (For an explanation of "concentration" and "isolation," please see earlier panels titled Measuring Segregation and African American Settlement Patterns.)

APIs are a small racial/ethnic minority. In the cities shown, they constitute the majority of all races (indeed of the total population) only in Honolulu, HI, which is, of course, on a Pacific Island. They have a larger population than blacks only in Bismarck, San Jose, San Francisco, and Honolulu. They also have a larger population than Hispanics in those cities, but in San Jose and San Francisco, the combined black/Hispanic population is higher than the API population. Not so in Honolulu.

Concentration levels — consistently higher than that for whites — appear to reflect cultural predilections. Concentration is an indirect measure of wealth. But APIs have the highest median family income of any group ($56,316 in 2000). Their ability to afford spacious housing is undisputed. The lowest concentration measure is for Honolulu, where APIs are the majority population.

Isolation levels are, again, very low where the population is low. Where the population is high, isolation measures closely reflect population, being highest in Honolulu, where APIs interact mostly with APIs. API neighborhoods are most closely clustered in New York, Los Angeles-Long Beach, Oakland, CA. and Orange County, CA (in that order). Clustering patterns, therefore (not shown) cannot be predicted strictly from API population density.

Asian and Pacific Islander settlement patterns show a tendency toward density (which is not necessitated by poverty) and the same inclination to live in cultural enclaves as exhibited by other races/ethnicities.

Source: U.S. Bureau of the Census. Housing and Household and Economic Statistics Division. Online. Available: census.gov/hhes.www.housing/resseg/def.htm. Presentation is from the work of Roderick J. Harrison and Daniel H. Weinberg, "Racial and Ethnic Residential Segregation: 1990."