In an earlier reading about Urban Enclaves, one of the authors discussed how many Latinos were the labor force driving the Asian restaurants and businesses, working in the kitchens and such in neighborhoods such as Flushing. This week’s reading went further in depth about immigrant labor. Two of the articles discussed the growing trend of Latino immigrants working in Korean immigrants’ businesses.
The trend is due to a number of factors. It starts out with the Korean immigrants. Korean immigrants arrive in America, and they encounter many struggles; one of the examples Kim gave was that their credentials earned in Korea don’t necessarily transfer over. Hence, they turn to other Koreans who have set up their own businesses. The problem, though, is that these Koreans only stay to learn the basic information. As Kim explains, most leave after mere months of working there. That led to the drive by Korean business owners to hire Latinos. Kim also discusses the trend which is that Koreans will not hire blacks as much as they hire Latinos. The main reason that Kim gives is that there are negative ideas about them, and that Latinos are attractive workers because they are often undocumented and the wages they earn are higher when they are exchanged for the currency at home.
In Bowles’s article, Bowles describes a multitude of problems surrounding immigrant entrepreneurship. For example, many immigrants experience “unfamiliarity with how business is done…lack of awareness about local regulations, limited financial literacy…little to no credit history” along with language problems. As seen in Kim’s article, some of the Latino immigrants reported that they couldn’t talk to fellow employees that weren’t Hispanic because they couldn’t speak Korean. The chef, the owner, everyone spoke Korean.
In Min’s article, Min describes the nature of Korean immigration to the United States: the numbers have gradually decreased over time as South Korea has become politically and economically stable. Koreans are very different from other Asian immigrants, however, as they are educated and many of the immigrants have been middle-class Christians. Unlike the Koreans, many of the immigrants that have emigrated have been from rural, working-class or peasant class backgrounds, and unlike their fellow Asian, Chines and Japanese immigrants are largely not Christians. Interestingly, Min uses the term ‘ghetto’ to describe the new Seoul located in Flushing. Why does she describe it as a ghetto, though, as it should and would be more accurately called an enclave? Min also stated that she searched for the new Korean community in New York by searching up the last name “Kim” which she claims is the most popular last name-why did she not choose to search up other popular last names? I found it a questionable method. Based on a series of tables in the article, Koreans have opened a large number of grocery stores as well as nail salons (which is evident), yet business was not something that many of these Koreans chose to pursue when they came to the U.S.
