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Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders and Opportunity

From The State of Opportunity in America Report

The Opportunity Agenda has released The State of Opportunity in America, the first national report to measure how opportunity is faring in the United States.  The report assesses the level of opportunity for all in our nation, with special attention to Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders, as well as other groups who have been denied full opportunity. 

Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders face many barriers to opportunity, some of which are noted below.  But a full assessment of opportunity among Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders is lacking because federal data are often missing or inadequately capture the diversity within these population groups.  The Office of Management and Budget’s decision in the late 1990s to begin disaggregating data for Pacific Islanders from that of Asian Americans was an important first step toward providing a fuller picture of opportunity for these groups, but much more remains to be done. 

We urge government leaders to take up the challenge of gathering the demographic data and other information necessary to determine how different groups of Americans are faring.

American opportunity means that everyone should have a fair chance to achieve his or her full potential.  Ensuring that fair chance requires equal treatment, economic security and mobility, a voice in decisions that affect us, a chance to start over after misfortune or missteps, and a sense of shared responsibility for each other as neighbors and fellow Americans.  The report assesses opportunity along each of these core American values and offers solutions to eliminate barriers so that everyone in our country has the chance to live the American Dream.

The report finds that, despite some areas of progress, opportunity is at risk for all Americans.  The traditional steppingstones to opportunity—an affordable home, a college education, a decent job at a living wage, access to quality health care, and economic security—are moving farther and farther out of reach for everyday Americans.  Findings and recommendations of particular relevance to Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders include the following:

Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders face multiple barriers, at rates much higher than the national average.  Many of these barriers are increasing and cannot be overcome through hard work and perseverance alone. 

• Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders are less likely than whites to have job-based health insurance—over one in five (21%) are uninsured.  They are also less likely to have a regular source of health care, and language barriers limit the access of many Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders to several types of health services.¹
• Asian Americans in the television news workforce declined from 4.1% in 2001 to 1.9% in 2005, and Asian Americans in the radio news workforce have not exceeded 1% since 1995.²
• Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders now hold over 2,000 elected and appointed positions in 37 states, the District of Columbia, American Samoa, Guam, and the Mariana Islands.  But the number of Asian Americans in Congress has not increased since 1990.³ 
• A 2004 study by the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission found that Asian American women remain far underrepresented among corporate officials and managers relative to their proportion in the population, comprising only 1.2% of these positions in 2001.⁴

Discrimination based on race persists, stifling the opportunity of millions of Americans.

• A 2000 U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development study found that Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders faced significant discrimination at levels comparable to African Americans and Latinos.  Asian Americans received poorer treatment relative to whites in 22% of rental markets and in 20% of housing sale markets.⁵
• Amnesty International has documented a dramatic rise in the rate of law enforcement stops and interrogation of Arab Americans, South Asian Americans, Muslim Americans, and Sikh Americans since September 11.⁶

Bold action by our government and national institutions is needed to expand opportunity for all.  The report urges our nation’s leaders to:

• Assess the impact of public policies on all dimensions of opportunity, by requiring Opportunity Impact Statements for all publicly funded projects. 
• Train Americans to adapt to a global economy, evolving technology, and an increasingly diverse population—with particular attention to groups of Americans who face the steepest barriers to opportunity.
• Modernize safety net programs that help people meet their basic needs and become economically secure.
• Renew a commitment to human rights in the United States, by vigorously enforcing existing civil rights laws and implementing a new generation of human rights laws.
• Protect democratic participation and promote diverse involvement in the American political process, by establishing minimum federal standards for voting equipment and procedures and by vigorously enforcing the Voting Rights Act and the Help America Vote Act.

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Endnotes

1. Kaiser Commission on Medicaid and the Uninsured, “Health Insurance Coverage and Access to Care Among Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders,” June 2000, www.kff.org(2 August 2005); U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, “Health Problems in Asian American/Pacific Islander and Native Hawaiian Women,” May 2003,
   http://www.4woman.gov/faq/Asian_Pacific.htm(13 August 2005).
2. B. Papper, “Running in Place: Minorities and Women in Television See Little Change, While Minorities Fare Worse in Radio,” Communicator, July/August 2005: 26-32; B. Papper, “Recovering Lost Ground: Minorities Gain Ground and Women Make Management Strides in Radio and TV Newsrooms in 2004,” Communicator, July/August 2004: 24-28; B. Papper, “Women & Minorities: One Step Forward and Two Steps Back,” Communicator, July/August 2003: 20-25; RTNDA, 2000 Women and Minorities Survey, 2000, www.rtnda.org(1 September 2005).
3. UCLA Asian American Studies Center and the Asian Pacific American Institute for Congressional Studies, National Asian Pacific American Political Almanac 2005-06, 2005, www.sscnet.ucla.edu/aasc/change/pamay17.html(13 September 2005).
4. Congressional Research Service, Membership of the 109th Congress: A Profile, May 2005, http://fpc.state.gov/documents/organization/49078.pdf(15 August 2005); Arab-American Institute, Roster of Arab-Americans in Public Service and Political Life 2004, August 2005, http://www.aaiusa.org/PDF/2005%20Roster.pdf(2 September 2005).
5. U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, Glass Ceilings: The Status of Women as Officials and Managers, March 2004, www.eeoc.gov(14 October 2005).
6. M. Turner and S. Ross, Discrimination in Metropolitan Housing Markets: Phase 2—Asians and Pacific Islanders (Washington, D.C.: U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, 2003).
7. Amnesty International, U.S. Domestic Human Rights Program, Threat and Humiliation: Racial Profiling, Domestic Security, and Human Rights in the United States (New York: Amnesty International USA, 2004).