Abstract
Using data from the 2000 U.S. Census, we investigate the schooling and earnings of single-race and multi-race Native Americans. Our analysis distinguishes between Single-Race Native Americans, biracial White Native Americans, biracial Hispanic-White Native Americans, and biracial Black Native Americans. Further differentiating by gender, the results indicate significant variation in socioeconomic attainments across these different Native American groups although almost all of them are in some way disadvantaged relative to non-Hispanic, non-Native American whites. The most disadvantaged group tends to be Single-Race Native Americans who have the lowest levels of schooling as well as lower earnings relative to non-Hispanic, non-Native American whites who are comparable in terms of schooling, age, and other basic demographic characteristics. The results demonstrate notable differentials by the racial/ethnic type of Native American group as well as by gender. In the case of men, all of the Native American groups have clear socioeconomic disadvantages. One contrast is that migration slightly increases the earnings of men but it slightly decreases the earnings of women. We interpret these findings as underscoring how measured socioeconomic differentials between demographic groups are significantly affected by the categorization of race/ethnicity in surveys and by how persons choose to be enumerated in terms of those categories.
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
Similar content being viewed by others
Notes
We use the terms “Native American” and “American Indian” interchangeably [although “American Indian” may be slightly more preferred among persons who identify with this racial category (Farley 1996, p. 212)].
For convenience, we use the term “multi-race persons” to refer to those who identify with two or more racial categories as officially designated in the 2000 Census.
Other data sets typically do not have a large enough sample size to study Native Americans especially when they are broken down into multi-race groups.
In this analysis, space limitations prohibit us from distinguishing between the different tribal affiliations of Native Americans.
As noted earlier, we recognize that our racial/ethnic categories are based on self-reported assessments of subjective identity. Our interpretation of the transitioning of Native American identity across generations is therefore necessarily speculative though nonetheless broadly consistent with the observed sample sizes in Tables 1 and 2.
Though not analyzed here, an additional ethnic complexity is tribal affiliation which can further complicate identity among all Native American groups including Single-Race Native Americans.
Eschbach et al. (1998) explicitly reached this general conclusion studying cohort changes in rates of Native American identification across Census data based on single-race information.
Snipp and Sandefur (1988) similarly argued than non-metropolitan to metropolitan migration per se did not have a major net effect on earnings among Native American men using the 1980 PUMS.
A recent survey of employers regarding their attitudes toward hiring members of different racial/ethnic groups does not even ask about Native Americans (Lim 2002).
Intergenerational advances in the socioeconomic attainments of Mexican-origin Americans may be understated if second and third generation Mexican-origin persons who are highly educated are less likely to identify as Mexican American compared to second and third generation Mexican-origin persons who are less educated (Duncan and Trejo 2005).
References
Aigner, D. J., & Cain, G. G. (1972). A statistical theory of discrimination in labor markets. Madison: University of Wisconsin.
Alba, R. D. (1990). Ethnic identity: The transformation of the white America. New Haven: Yale University Press.
Alba, R., & Nee, V. (2003). Remaking the American mainstream: Assimilation and contemporary immigration. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
Andresen, E. M., Fitch, C. A., McLendon, P. M., & Meyers, A. R. (2000). Reliability and validity of disability questions for US Census 2000. American Journal of Public Health, 90, 1297–1299.
Chew, K. S. Y., Eggebeen, D. J., & Uhlenberg, P. R. (1989). American children in multiracial households. Sociological Perspectives, 32, 65–85.
Choi, K. H., Sakamoto, A., & Powers, D. A. (2008). Who is hispanic? Hispanic identity among African Americans, Asian Americans, others, and whites. Sociological Inquiry, 78, 335–371.
Croy, C. D., Bezdek, M., Mitchell, C. M., & Spicer, P. (2009). Young adult migration from a northern plains Indian reservation: Who stays and who leaves. Population Research and Policy Review. doi:10.1007/s11113-008-9123-4
Deloria, V., Jr. (1969). Custer died for your sins: An Indian manifesto. New York: Macmilian.
Duncan, B., & Trejo, S. J. (2005). Ethnic identification, intermarriage, and unmeasured progress by Mexican Americans. National Bureau of Economic Research Working Paper #11423. Cambridge, MA: National Bureau of Economic Research.
Eschbach, K. (1993). Changing identification among American Indians and Alaska natives. Demography, 30, 635–652.
Eschbach, K. (1995). The enduring and vanishing American Indian: American Indian population growth and intermarriage in 1990. Ethnic and Racial Studies, 18, 89–108.
Eschbach, K., Supple, K., & Snipp, C. M. (1998). Changes in racial identification and the educational attainment of American Indians, 1970-1990. Demography, 35(1), 35–43.
Farley, R. (1996). The new American reality: Who we are, how we got here, where we are going. New York: Russell Sage Foundation.
Featherman, D. L., & Hauser, R. M. (1978). Opportunity and change. New York: Academic Press.
Ferrante, J., & Brown, P., Jr. (1999). Classifying people by race. In F. L. Pincus & H. J. Ehrlich (Eds.), Race and ethnic conflict: Contending views on prejudice, discrimination, and ethnoviolence (pp. 14–33). Boulder, CO: Westview Press.
Fixico, D. (2006). Daily life of Native Americans in the twentieth century. Westport, CT/London: Greenwood Press.
Freeman, C. & Fox, M. A. (2005). Status and trends in the education of American Indians and Alaska Natives (NCES 2005-108). U.S. Department of Education, National Center for Education Statistics. Washington, DC: U.S. Government Printing Office.
Gordon, M. (1964). Assimilation in American life: The role of race, religion and national origins. New York: Oxford University Press.
Hwang, S.-S., Saenz, R., & Aguirre, B. E. (1997). Structural and assimilationist explanations of Asian American intermarriage. Journal of Marriage and the Family, 59, 758–772.
Kirschenman, J., & Neckerman, K. M. (1991). “We’d love to hire them, but…”: The meaning of race for employers. In C. Jencks & P. E. Peterson (Eds.), The urban underclass (pp. 203–232). Washington: Brookings Institution.
Lamont, M., & Molnar, V. (2002). The study of boundaries in the social sciences. Annual Review of Sociology, 28, 167–195.
Lee, J., & Bean, F. D. (2004). America’s changing color lines: Immigration, race/ethnicity, and multiracial identification. Annual Review of Sociology, 30, 221–242.
Levine, S., & Lurie, N. O. (1968). The American Indian today. Deland, FL: Everett Edwards.
Lieberson, S. (1985). Unhyphenated whites in the United States. Ethnic and Racial Studies, 8, 159–180.
Lim, N. (2002). Who has soft-skills?: Employers’ subjective ratings of work qualities of racial and ethnic groups. RAND working paper #02-10. Santa Monica, CA: RAND Corporation.
McKinnish, T. (2008). Spousal mobility and earnings. Demography, 45, 829–849.
Moss, P. I., & Tilly, C. (2001). Stories employers tell: Race, skill, and hiring in America. New York: Russell Sage Foundation.
Nagel, J. (1995). American Indian ethnic renewal: Politics and the resurgence of identity. American Sociological Review, 60, 947–965.
Neckerman, K. M. (2004). Social inequality. New York: Russell Sage Foundation.
Palloni, A. (2006). Reproducing inequalities: Luck, wallets, and the enduring effects of childhood health. Demography, 43, 587–615.
Park, R. E. (1950). Race and culture. Glencoe, IL: The Free Press.
Passel, J. S. (1997). The growing American Indian population, 1960–1990: Beyond demography. Population Research and Policy Review, 16, 11–31.
Passel, J. S., & Berman, P. A. (1986). Quality of 1980 census data for American Indians. Social Biology, 33, 163–182.
Perlmann, J., & Waters, M. C. (2002). The new race question: How the census counts multiracial individuals. New York: Russell Sage Foundation.
Petersen, T. (1989). The earnings function in sociological studies of earnings inequality. Research in Social Stratification and Mobility, 8, 221–250.
Qian, Z., & Lichter, D. T. (2007). Social boundaries and marital assimilation: Interpreting trends in racial and ethnic intermarriage. American Sociological Review, 72, 68–94.
Rampey, B. D., Lutkus, A. D., & Weiner, A. W. (2006). National Indian education study, part I: The performance of American Indian and Alaska Native fourth- and eighth-grade students on NAEP 2005 reading and mathematics assessments (NCES 2006-463). U.S. Department of Education, Institute of Education Sciences, National Center for Education Statistics. Washington, DC: Government Printing Office.
Reskin, B. F., & Roos, P. A. (1990). Job queues, gender queues: Explaining women’s inroads into male occupations. Philadelphia: Temple University Press.
Riche, M. F. (2000). America’s diversity and growth: Signposts for the 21st century. Population Bulletin, Vol. 55, No. 2. Washington, DC: Population Reference Bureau.
Root, M. P. P. (1992). Racially mixed people in America. Newbury Park, CA: Sage Publications.
Root, M. P. P. (1996). The multiracial experience: Racial borders as the new frontier. Thousand Oaks: Sage Publications.
Saenz, R., & Morales, M. C. (2005). Demography of race and ethnicity. In D. L. Poston & M. Micklin (Eds.), Handbook of population (pp. 169–208). New York: Springer Publishers.
Saenz, R., Hwang, S.-S., Aguirre, B. E., & Anderson, R. N. (1995). Persistence and change in Asian identity among children of intermarried couples. Sociological Perspectives, 38, 175–194.
Sakamoto, A., Wu, H.-H., & Tzeng, J. (2000). The declining significance of race among American men during the latter half of the twentieth century. Demography, 37, 41–51.
Sandefur, G. D., & McKinnell, T. (1986). Native American intermarriage. Social Science Research, 15, 347–371.
Sandefur, G. D., & Sakamoto, A. (1988). American Indian household structure and income. Demography, 25, 71–80.
Sandefur, G. D., & Scott, W. J. (1983). Minority group status and the wages of Indian and black males. Social Science Research, 12, 44–68.
Snipp, C. M. (1989). American Indians: The first of this land. New York, NY: Russell Sage Foundation.
Snipp, C. M. (1992). Sociological perspectives on American Indians. Annual Review of Sociology, 18, 351–371.
Snipp, C. M. (1997). The size and distribution of the American Indian population: Fertility, mortality, migration, and residence. Population Research and Policy Review, 16, 61–93.
Snipp, C. M., & Sandefur, G. D. (1988). Earnings of American Indians and Alaskan natives: The effects of residence and migration. Social Forces, 66, 994–1008.
Spickard, P. R. (1989). Mixed blood: Intermarriage and ethnic identity in twentieth-century America. Madison, WI: University of Wisconsin Press.
Spickard, P. R. (1992). The illogic of American racial categories. In M. P. P. Root (Ed.), Racially mixed people in America (pp. 12–23). Newbury Park, CA: Sage Publications.
Steiner, S. (1968). The new Indians. New York: Harper & Row.
Thornton, R. (1987). American Indian holocaust and survival: A population history since 1492. Norman, OK: University of Oklahoma Press.
Thornton, R. (1997). Tribal membership requirements and the demography of ‘old’ and ‘new’ Native Americans. Population Research and Policy Review, 16, 33–42.
Thurow, L. C. (1975). Generating inequality. New York: Basic Books.
U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. (2001). Mental health: Culture, race, and ethnicity—a supplement to mental health: A report of the surgeon general. Rockville, MD: U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration, Center for Mental Health Services.
Warner, W. L., & Leo, S. (1945). The social systems of American ethnic groups. New Haven: Yale University Press.
Wax, M. L. (1971). Indian Americans; unity and diversity. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall.
Weppner, R. S. (1971). Urban economic opportunities: The example of Denver. In J. O. Waddell & O. M. Watson (Eds.), The American Indian in urban society (pp. 245–273). Boston: Little Brown and Company.
Xie, Y., & Goyette, K. (1997). The racial identification of biracial children with one Asian parent: Evidence from the 1990 census. Social Forces, 76, 547–570.
Yancey, W. L., Ericksen, E. P., & Juliani, R. N. (1976). Emergent ethnicity: A review and reformation. American Sociological Review, 41, 391–403.
Zhou, M. (1997). Segmented assimilation: Issues, controversies, and recent research on the new second generation. International Migration Review, 31, 975–1008.
Acknowledgment
We thank the Population Research Center of the University of Texas for excellent research support.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Huyser, K.R., Sakamoto, A. & Takei, I. The Persistence of Racial Disadvantage: The Socioeconomic Attainments of Single-Race and Multi-Race Native Americans. Popul Res Policy Rev 29, 541–568 (2010). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11113-009-9159-0
Received:
Accepted:
Published:
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11113-009-9159-0