Qingfang Wang

Measuring Ethnic Labour Market Concentration and Segmentation

With the huge influx of immigrants into the United States in recent years, considerable efforts have been devoted to describing the extent and variation of labour market concentration across ethnic groups within or between regions. However, there is no consensus among social scientists on how to measure and identify ethnic labour market concentration patterns. The issues mainly include, firstly, how to define an employment sector—as an industrial or an occupational sector; secondly, how to break down employment categories; and thirdly the extent to which a job sector can be identified as an ethnic-concentrated sector, that is, what index and what threshold value should be used to define a ‘niche’ sector? Using the case of Chinese in the San Francisco Consolidated Metropolitan Statistical Area, this paper demonstrates how different choices could encourage different evaluation and understanding of multi-ethnic urban labour market segmentation processes.

Race/Ethnicity, Gender and Job Earnings across Metropolitan Areas in the United States: A Multilevel Analysis:

Using the US 5 per cent Public Use Microdata Samples (PUMS) and Census Summary Files from the year 2000, and a multilevel linear modelling strategy, this study examines the effects of a range of individual and metropolitan-area characteristics on the job earnings of US-born Whites and Blacks, foreign-born Hispanics and Asians, separately by men and women. The key findings suggest that macroeconomic structure and racial composition have significant influences on interracial and gender earnings disparities, although the direction and magnitude are different among groups. Results also show that all racial and gender groups would benefit from a more evenly distributed labour market among ethnic minorities and immigrants. With respect to gender issues, the earning gaps between racial groups are greater than between men and women. However, compared with men, women workers are more sensitive to macroeconomic conditions, racial residential segregation and labour market segmentation.Using the US 5 per cent Public Use Microdata Samples (PUMS) and Census Summary Files from the year 2000, and a multilevel linear modelling strategy, this study examines the effects of a range of individual and metropolitan-area characteristics on the job earnings of US-born Whites and Blacks, foreign-born Hispanics and Asians, separately by men and women. The key findings suggest that macroeconomic structure and racial composition have significant influences on interracial and gender earnings disparities, although the direction and magnitude are different among groups. Results also show that all racial and gender groups would benefit from a more evenly distributed labour market among ethnic minorities and immigrants. With respect to gender issues, the earning gaps between racial groups are greater than between men and women. However, compared with men, women workers are more sensitive to macroeconomic conditions, racial residential segregation and labour market segmentation.

Constructing a multilevel spatial approach in ethnic entrepreneurship studies

Purpose – The aim of this paper is to review and synthesize an interdisciplinary literature on ethnic entrepreneurship studies from a spatial perspective. The major goal is to develop an analytical framework for understanding how place plays a role in ethnic entrepreneurship processes at different geographic scales.Design/methodology/approach – The article starts with a review of perspectives on ethnic entrepreneurship from multiple disciplines in social sciences, mainly from a non‐spatial approach. It then critically discusses the spatial inquiries on ethnic entrepreneurship, with a focus on identifying the gaps across disciplines. Based on these discussions, a comprehensive, multilevel spatial framework is finally conceptualized. Following that, the concluding remarks highlight future directions and public policy significance by implementing this suggested social‐spatial approach.Findings – As the central social actors, ethnic entrepreneurs weave through multiscaled geographic contexts in the process of...

Immigrant underemployment across US metropolitan areas: From a spatial perspective

A significant number of immigrants fail to realise their full potential in the US labour markets, as evidenced by those working in occupations requiring skill levels far below their own level of education. While previous studies have studied immigrant underemployment with a focus on individual labour force characteristics, the spatial dimensions of immigrant underemployment have been largely overlooked. Using microdata from the 2006–2010 American Community Survey and a multilevel research design, this study examines the interaction of metropolitan labour market characteristics with individual labour force’s underemployment experiences, and explores how these interaction effects differ between the foreign-born and the native-born. Results suggest that the probability of individual labour force’s underemployment within any metropolitan area is highly contingent on metropolitan labour market characteristics including ethnic diversity, the proportion of its foreign-born population, the economic structure, and the level of educational attainment of the labour force, in addition to individual characteristics.

The Characteristics and Concentration of SNAP-Approved Stores and Community Health

We conducted a cross-sectional, ecological study of the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) food environment in a large US Southeastern urban county, examining types of stores that accept SNAP, foods sold, and store locations. Negative binomial regression examined associations between the concentration of SNAP-approved full-service and limited-service stores and premature death to due heart disease and diabetes. Most SNAP-approved stores in low-income communities offered limited food choice; less than 1% sold fresh fruits and vegetables. In adjusted analysis, each additional limited-service SNAP store was associated with 23% more premature deaths due to heart disease.

BEYOND ETHNIC ENCLAVES? EXPLORING THE SPATIAL DISTRIBUTION OF LATINO‐OWNED EMPLOYER FIRMS IN TWO U.S. IMMIGRATION GATEWAYS

ABSTRACT: The Latino population in the United States has increased dramatically during the past several decades. However, Latino-owned businesses have been understudied. Even less is known about these firms’ spatial distribution. Built on an interdisciplinary literature on industrial locations and ethnic economies, this study examines how the development of ethnic minority–owned businesses is contingent on the local neighborhood as both a work site and habitat. Using a confidential national survey of ethnic minority–owned businesses in the United States, this study compares the spatial distribution of Latino-owned employer firms in the Miami and Atlanta metropolitan areas. Consistent with previous research, results from this study strongly reinforce the importance of a connection between ethnic population concentration and emergence of ethnic businesses. A concentration of local businesses and co-locating with other businesses, regardless of ethnicity, are very important as well. Such agglomeration effects seem particularly important for new immigration destinations like Atlanta where a favorable entrepreneurial environment is still being developed for ethnic minority businesses. However, the positive effects from co-locating with local businesses are not linear. A threshold effect and small count preferences are detected in the two study areas.

THE EMERGENCE OF ETHNIC NICHES IN NEW IMMIGRANT DESTINATIONS: AN EXAMINATION OF ATLANTA'S LABOR MARKET, 1980-1990

The entry of foreign-born workers into U.S. metropolitan labor markets was associated with a rise in ethnic niches, i.e., occupations dominated by ethnic workers. Our study examines the emergence of ethnic niches in the Atlanta Metropolitan Statistical Area, whose foreign-born population began to increase in the 1980s. Using the 1980 and 1990 PUMS data, we first develop an odds ratio to identify the occupational niches associated with different ethnic groups, and then examine the relative earnings of niche workers. We then compare the determinants of job earnings for niche and nonniche jobs using regression analysis. Our findings reveal a sharp ethnic segmentation of the labor force as early as in 1980. The economic advantages of niche employment vary by ethnic group, with the skill level of the job and the extent of ethnic social capital being important factors. Overall, the economic implications of niche employment for foreign-born and native-born workers were strongly contingent on the particular nature of Atlantas economic growth in the past few decades.

African American and Hispanic Self-Employment in the Charlotte Metropolitan Area

Using the Public Usable Microdata Samples (PUMS) in year 2000, this study examines the self-employment of U.S.-born blacks and foreign-born Hispanics in the Charlotte metropolitan area that has been transformed dramatically by immigration in recent decades. The industrial concentration patterns of the two groups indicate a possible succession between them depending on to what extent the local labor market is transformed by immigration. The ethnic diversity, history of immigration, and the economic structure in the local area have provided different opportunities and challenges for ethnic minorities and immigrants to start up and maintain their own businesses. This study suggests that the process of economic incorporation of ethnic minorities depends significantly on the institutional capacity and social, cultural, and political resources of local communities.