Gendered context of assimilation: the female second-generation advantage among Latinos

ABSTRACT

Recent macro-level trends have created a gendered context of assimilation for second-generation Latinos, pointing to favourable condition among Latina women and potential vulnerability among Latino men. This article examines second-generation assimilation in young adulthood for the top ten Latino groups using gendered reference groups to benchmark their integration into American society. We find a significant female advantage on individual-level indicators, but no clear gender differences on household-level indicators among Latinos. We also document significant heterogeneity in achievement among the top ten Latino ethnic groups, with Mexicans being the most disadvantaged group. In contrast, Cubans and South Americans are the most advantaged and have achieved parity with native whites. These findings point to the emerging significance of gender as a key dimension of stratification in the assimilation of Latinos into American life.

KEYWORDS:

• Hispanics/Latinos
• gender
• second generation
• assimilation
• immigrant incorporation

Acknowledgements

We would like to thank Tom DiPrete, Herb Gans, Kathleen Griesbach, Phil Kasinitz, Shamus Khan, Jennifer Lee, participants of the Race, Ethnicity and Migration Workshop at Columbia University, the JEMS co-editors and anonymous reviewers for their constructive feedback which has strengthened our final draft. This research has also been presented at the annual meetings of the Eastern Sociological Society and the American Sociological Association in 2016. This research was partially supported by a Poverty Center Grant awarded to the Center on Poverty and Inequality at Stanford University (grant number AE00101) from the US Department of Health and Human Services, Office of the Assistant Secretary for Planning and Evaluation, and awarded by the Substance Abuse Mental Health Service Administration and a sub-award (grant number H79 AE000101-02S1) titled ‘Poverty, Inequality, and Mobility among Hispanic Populations: An Innovative Subgrant Research Program at the Stanford Center on Poverty and Inequality’ funded by ACF's Office of Planning, Research, and Evaluation. All remaining errors are our own

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

ORCID

Van C. Tran http://orcid.org/0000-0002-2532-6811

Notes

1 A word about missing data in CPS. There are three forms of missing data in CPS-ASEC: the basic CPS sample non-response, the ASEC supplement non-response and the survey item non-response. The non-response rate to the basic CPS is 8.6% for 2008, 7.8% for 2010 and 9.8% for 2012. The non-response rate to the ASEC is 7.7% for 2008, 6.9% for 2010 and 10.4% for 2012. To deal with basic CPS non-response, we use the weights supplied by CPS to adjust for respondent households to reflect the population. To deal with ASEC non-response and item non-response, we use the imputed values by CPS in all of our analyses. The average for both ASEC and survey item non-response in our final pooled sample was 10.1%. The microdata we use is complete due to CPS imputation procedures which fill in missing values from similar individuals and households. For more info, see Current Population Survey, 2012 ASEC Technical Documentation, pp. 300–301. Online at: https://www.census.gov/prod/techdoc/cps/cpsmar12.pdf

2 The selected occupational outcomes follow the major occupational codes from the U.S. Census. These occupational categories capture both the low and high end of the labor market because socioeconomic attainment often involves members of later generations moving away from the service sector and construction industries into administrative (i.e. lower middle class) and professional occupations (i.e. middle to upper-middle-class). The analyses on occupation are limited to those who reported being employed in the year prior to the survey.

Additional information

Funding

This research was partially supported by a Poverty Center Grant awarded to the Center on Poverty and Inequality at Stanford University [grant number AE00101] from the US Department of Health and Human Services, Office of the Assistant Secretary for Planning and Evaluation, and awarded by the Substance Abuse Mental Health Service Administration and a sub-award [grant number H79 AE000101-02S1] titled ‘Poverty, Inequality, and Mobility among Hispanic Populations: An Innovative Subgrant Research Program at the Stanford Center on Poverty and Inequality’ funded by ACF’s Office of Planning, Research, and Evaluation. All remaining errors are our own.