Portrait of Disadvantage Among Asian Americans in New York City in 2022

Special Reports and Populations
Written By Sonia Huq

This Asian American, Native Hawaiian, and Pacific Islander (AANHPI) Heritage Month, we’re looking at how poverty, disadvantage, and discrimination negatively impact Asian American New Yorkers, a diverse population that has fallen through the cracks when it comes to data representation. Poverty Tracker data finds that, in 2022:

  • Nearly 1 in 4 Asian New Yorkers live in poverty, nearly twice the poverty rate of White New Yorkers (24% vs. 13%).

  • Foreign-born Asian New Yorkers are nearly three times more likely than U.S.-born Asian New Yorkers to be in poverty (27% vs. 9%).

    • Additionally, 40% of Asian New Yorkers with limited English proficiency are in poverty, 15 percentage points higher than those with English proficiency.

  • Nearly 3 in 4 (71%) Asian New Yorkers in our sample* reported discrimination experiences in their everyday lives, representing an increase from 43% in 2020.

*Due to sample size constraints, we do not have a representative sample of NHPI New Yorkers in this dataset. An ideal dataset would have sufficient responses to be able to represent this diversity of experiences among Asian subgroups and NHPI New Yorkers.

Sonia Huq
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