 There are actually way more Asian Americans in poverty than you might think so we got to talk about these new stats Yeah, everybody think the immigrant is like a rich nerd, but that's just me What about the people at the restaurant I go to we got to talk about it NPR just dropped this new study one in ten Asian Americans live in poverty their experiences very widely research says this is an article by Juliana Kim and man It got posted on Reddit and there's a lot of comments Andrew We're gonna talk about it break it down give you all sides of the angle make sure you like subscribe turning your notifications Check out smile a sauce and smile a sauce comm Andrew in New York City Asians actually have the highest poverty rate However, a lot of people Andrew would not believe you if you said that right? Yeah, no I mean because everybody sees these stats, you know, I can point at this median household incomes Indians Filipinos Japanese Chinese are even all higher than the average US population on a aggregate Macro scale, but in New York City Andrew There are actually a ton of recent immigrants that are elderly and they have incomes oftentimes Andrew below $15,000 USD a year. Yeah, so let's look at some aspects of this article David. Um, first of all, it said a Lot of Chinese Korean Cambodians Vietnamese Bengali Lao and Pakistani people they have a poverty rate of about 10 to 13 percent You know somewhere in that range and then on the higher end a 17 percent for Hmong people 16 percent for Mongolian and 19 percent for Burmese people And then obviously there's kind of like your Japanese Sri Lankan Filipino American which range between like six and nine percent Here's an interesting stat from the article. They quote a lot of different research guys Here's a link in the bottom It says the analysis also found that 26 percent of all Asians in America living below the poverty line are Located in three major cities New York City Los Angeles in San Francisco. Yeah, I mean, these are the big Asian cities right these three cities There's a lot of immigrants that a lot of people you know when people think about Asians in America Andrew Aren't they often thinking about Asians in the suburbs? Yeah, maybe like us studying hard trying to be a valedictorian or something like that They're thinking about the whiz can break dancing in the ABDC style Jabba walkies dance group or whatever You know what I mean with going to 88 rising concerts However, there's a ton of people coming over that are really Uneducated and don't really have the language skills to secure like a stable mainstream source of income, right? I mean, I would I believe the stats say that most of the Asian Americans in poverty Foreign-born and immigrants. Yes. So here's the thing a lot of people think immigrants don't count as Asian Americans But Asian Americans in this term literally just means Asians living in America So you could have arrived ten days ago and you now count as an Asian American if you live here, right? Right because because your intention is to come here and stay and have your kids stay in your grandkids Stay to become American. Yeah, and you know if you come from a poor family over there and your English profits Proficiency is not very high then over here You really only have limited opportunities until you can get your English to a point where one you can learn new things Very easily very quickly from all the resources in America and also work More higher paying jobs, right, right, right? Um, somebody said Asian Americans spoke about not knowing how to save or invest So 57% of Asian adults living in poverty said they were unable to save for emergencies this past year And then a lot of people were able to say that they just don't know they don't know about investments They don't know about financial literacy and here's the interesting thing Andrew the Asian community There's it's so variable But it it's it's true that even internally within the Asian community very few of the discussions center around the impoverished crowd Right. Yeah, exactly exactly at all centers around Representation and all these beautiful Asians and the rich Bob's and Ferraris coming over as international students or or oh like I'm so I can't get into my Yale or Harvard Ah, you know, that's a real side. That's a real side. Yeah, I'm not saying those aren't problems But definitely there are a lot of Asians in poverty now. Obviously you can say hey It's not my responsibility to get people out of poverty. That's not my family That's a possible response, right? Right, right. I'm gonna talk about that later And last but not least in the NPR article it stated Andrew us born Asian Americans express skepticism that educational no guarantees Success so basically foreign born Asian participants in the study believe that education was the key to getting out of poverty US born Asians said that it depended on the type of degree that you got so actually I I agree and disagree with everybody. I think getting educated is really important But it is true that if you just get educated and then you pursue like Fields that really have a very low earning cap. That's not gonna be the best way to lift yourself out of poverty, right? Anyway, let's just get into some quick thoughts that I have about this. I think that The truth is it's tough because there's a lot of people who come over and maybe you're a refugee Maybe you're a non-refugee. Maybe you just are a political dissident. Maybe you just came over seeking wealth You it's true that you may have physical disabilities You may have mental disabilities. You may have an emotional disability or you may just have been so coached From a system Andrew deep in the rural mountains or the villages It's difficult to come to a place like New York City, LA or Los Angeles and figure out how to fit into like the hyper late-stage Capitalism it's gonna be really really difficult and I think that that's why Certain types of immigrants, especially when they immigrate in an older age Andrew around New York City. You see old Chinese people from China picking up cans or Rummaging through garbage for a living. Yeah, and I think that that's something that is a really really striking I I do think that this here's also the truth poverty Exists everywhere. I've lived in China. You see poverty all the time. You're gonna see poverty How do you think Asian Americans should react to seeing somebody from that is Asian or their group? Being living on the street or living in poverty. Yeah, I mean, I think that it happens. There's obviously not Visually a lot of homeless Asian people, but there are some and you know, it just goes to show you here We had the probably the closer you are and in to if you're part of one of the groups that has a lot of poverty you have a higher chance of Possibly drug use and then once you go down that path, you're an immigrant. Maybe you don't speak English I mean, I've definitely seen some of these Asian looking homeless guys out here. It doesn't sound like their English is very good Obviously sounds like that they had drug issues and then now they're out on the streets, right? But also poverty I do want to know just because you're under the poverty line doesn't mean you don't have a home either You know what I mean? Like people can have homes can literally have shelter like An apartment or a house somewhere and still be under pop the poverty line, right? Right, right, right? Also by the way guys, we want to stress there was a huge jump in Poverty improvement from first generation to second generation because if you're born in America Then guess what you've had access to American preschool and kindergarten in first grade and second grade And it's gonna lend you to help figure things out Somebody said that there was a lot of talk about the model minority myth Andrew the poor Mingling with the middle class the middle class trying to get to upper middle class and rich Asians And do they actually care about each other once they're in America? I will say this I Don't think that Asians of different Socioeconomic classes make it their mission to think about each other to be honest I don't think the rich Asians make it their mission to help the poor Asians because They didn't do that when they got rich in Asia either, right, right, so it's just like I don't yeah I just don't think that it's very Asian in a weird way to like care about the poor unless you're really religious in a Buddhist or Converted to Christianity type of way Somebody said most suburban Asians tend to live in a bubble mindset I know I was raised in a upper middle class on clave in the Bay Area And I wasn't even aware of Asian poverty until I left as an adult. Yeah. Yeah, I mean I don't think I think Asians have a lot of shame and even if they are a poor family They don't like to show it obviously living in dense New York and lower East side like we see it a lot We used to live in this walk-up building where some of the units were newly renovated and then some of the units still belong to families who probably Might fall under the poverty line because that by the poverty line guys I am referring to this where it's it's by family size And if you have a family of one individual and you make less than about 15,000 you might come under the poverty But if you're a family of four and you collectively make less than 30,000 you would fall under poverty, right? This next comment was addressing this study and we're gonna pop up the study here by three Asian American sociologists And it was talking about second-generation college education attainment and or Vietnamese have a 30% jump From a 40% to 70% it is the biggest jump of every group every group generally sees a jump though interestingly enough You're doing so you're saying Vietnamese People make the biggest jump out of poverty from the first to the second generation. Yes Yes, using college education attainment as a proxy It's not a perfect one-to-one, but there's a lot of studies this show getting college educated is a great way to get out Of poverty their numbers jump from 26% to 62.4 interestingly enough Filipino-Americans and are the only group where the second generation of Filipinos has less college degrees than the first generation that came over And I think that that's because a lot of my Filipino friends that I grew up with like work for UPS or Like figure out like a more blue collar lifestyle become like barbers and stuff like that Obviously not all some of them become DJs some of them go to school too. It's a variance But certainly Filipino kids second generation tend to enter like more unorthodox fields for Asians Somebody said when I see a homeless Asian woman It really messes me up because it reminds me as somebody in my family and it's not a sight that I'm used to seeing Yeah, I guess How do you think Asians should react to seeing homeless Asian people because it's not something that you're really accustomed to seeing But here's the thing Andrew every other group there They have to be accustomed to it whether you're white black or Latino because it's more common So should Asians like freak out when it does happen or is it just like we should just look at it Like we're back in Asia because if you go to Asia and you've been to any Asian country even Japan But obviously much less in Japan relative to other parts of Asia or Korea But it's like or Singapore has a lot less Taiwan has a lot less. There are homeless people even in Asia So but as Asian-Americans should we be like freaking out that there's homeless Asian-Americans Yeah, I mean let us know in the comments down below what you think Somebody said the model minority myth is one of the worst things because it's gonna make us ignore this 10% of Asians living in poverty for me this general statement is like It's a it's just a trend I don't really believe in the model minority myth or disbelieve in it It's just people tend to look at narratives in an overly simplified way We have to include impoverished Asians into the narrative That way they can get to the solutions and the solutions primarily would probably be English proficiency or Translators they can help them get into the right programs because a lot of people they might not even be aware of the programs that they Qualify for and can take advantage of exactly and a lot of like Asian Immigrants especially they don't understand how you can invest in America or get a loan and open up a business or things like that I mean I would say yeah, generally in the Asian community. Maybe there's a little bit more talk about that Then maybe some other communities, but yeah overall if you're if you just do not understand the language of the land It just makes things everything harder. Right, right. Um, I think having family here getting plugged into a system That's why these churches and community organizations are so important. Um, I'll say this man Asian poverty is real and It's it's difficult because you can never eliminate poverty from the world and imbalances and stuff like that people are gonna be born into different types of families with different knowledge bases and different networks and They're more identity. They're born with or the decisions they make allow them to maneuver in a different spaces and get into this knowledge base Or get into this tribe or get into this fishbowl And I think that a lot of that in life like can determine sort of the The tree branches and the forks in the road that your life ends up taking, you know, so I think that this is a really interesting study I think that people are born different I will say this for everybody who really wants to help people and they're they're you know They're the bleeding heart of their group of friends or something like that. It's really important that you help people closest to you That's the first thing and then after you feel like you've stabilized that first of all You should encourage the people you help to help other people to pass it down But then helping your immediate community Yeah, because that's where you have the most impact of and that's whose ear that you have the most to because there's no The biggest thing is like talking to people whose ears are open and receptive and they're like a sponge And they could soak up the knowledge that you give them. Yeah, I mean, I also think that there's more and more YouTube content In language like in Asian languages. I mean, I know I see a lot in Chinese Maybe that's the most prevalent one because obviously a lot of people speak Chinese So it might be harder to find resources and more niche languages But I think just sharing knowledge amongst the community. Yeah, the people closest to you is important, you know But yeah, again, everybody has their choices and everybody does come in different situations So all you're gonna really do is also have some empathy for sure situations less scams guys less spam and more teaching guys Come on man, especially the scamming in the immigrant community in 2024. It's way out of hand Anyway, guys, let us know what you guys think of Asian poverty and these stats in this study in the comments section below Until next time we the hop hop boys. We out. Peace