English Proficiency, Education, and the Conditional Economic Assimilation of Hispanic and Asian Origin Men

Abstract

We consider the hypothesis that earnings of Asian and white Hispanic men follow a pattern calledconditional economic assimilation:White Hispanic and Asian men who do not speak English well and who have little schooling tend to earn less money than white nonHispanic men who also do not speak English well and who also have little schooling, but Asians and white Hispanics who are fluent in English and have completed high school tend to earn about as much as nonHispanic whites with similar schooling and English fluency. Although prior literature and contemporary discrimination law attributes minority earnings disadvantages to lower rates of return to human capital for minority group members than for white nonHispanics, a mathematical model indicates that conditional assimilation is produced byhigherrates of return to English language fluency and schooling for Asians and white Hispanics than for white nonHispanics. Analyses of 1980 U.S. Census Public Use Microdata Samples dramatically supports that model. We also consider theoretical differences between race and ethnicity and differences between the mechanisms which produce race and ethnicity effects on minority earnings. Some of these hypothesized mechanisms involve human capital and worker productivity, while others involve discrimination. Discrimination mechanisms imply an interaction effect between English fluency and educational attainment for white nonHispanics and, to a lesser extent, white Hispanics, but not Asians, while human capital mechanisms imply language–schooling interactions for all. Our data analyses are consistent with the hypothesis that discrimination mechanisms are operative.