[alfredallan1]

You’re starting to touch the issue, but IMO, not quite. Allow me to present a somewhat controversial approach.

Considering the US only: at the risk of extreme and borderline stereotypical generalizations - if one looks at the history of immigration into the country - the Asian immigrants have largely consisted of Chinese laborers around the gold rush, Indian truck drivers and motel/cornershop owners in the early - mid 1900’s. They came to make a living in somewhat decent conditions. Both lines of work require you to be reasonably honest, keep your head down and do the job. It can be presumed these were the values these Asian parents inculcated into their children - who saw the pathway to their version of the American dream as a relatively low risk SME. The Asian immigrants since the 1960s have been largely STEM people - academic high performers, given the nature of university admissions and the visa process. STEM high performers - as individuals, and presumably as parents too, tend to be intelligent but sensible (risk-rational), belive in very hard work, tend not to oversocialize, to not brag a whole lot, and tend to prioritize knowledge/lifestyle over blind ambition and obscene wealth. None of those traits are directly conducive to being a top exec, but rather to a job like VP - engg.

An excellent case in point - as another commenter also mentioned, if you go to Asian cities, you’ll find exactly the sort of “persona” you’d find in a typical Western exec, often exaggerated to an even higher level. But that persona hasn’t made it to US shores, instead choosing to make it big in their own place.

In contrast, many of the earliest “white” immigrants came here first for ideological reasons, and later driven by ambitions of striking it big, and often by delusions of grandeur, and were significantly less risk-averse than either groups of Asian immigrants I mentioned earlier. Of course there were plenty of regular folks too.

So I would submit that instead of looking at just Asians/whites making it to top exec, one should look at 1) professional backgrounds of the parents of top execs, 2) fraction of those with highest academic/test scores making it to top exec. Of course, to be a successful top exec, the need for “top” academic scores is outweighed by a host of other qualifications. Asians in whom these “other” qualifications are found in ample measure often do make it big in their home countries, but might make terrible immigrants to the US.

[azs114]

This is the problem. You assume the situation is justified and try to find an explanation for it. Would you submit this kind of theories if the article is talking about any other groups?

[alfredallan1]

You’re conflating two different things - 1) justification and 2) explanation, and with that misinterpreting the gist of my post.

Just because it has a valid explanation doesn’t mean it is just, nor that it should continue. I was trying to give one possible background for why things are they way they are - not the way they should be.

The situation is starting to change, but it simply cannot happen overnight, the best case scenario for sustainable change is a couple of generations of sustained effort from all sides. Look at how the Italian and Irish immigrants went from pariahs to normal. The Chinese have gone from manual labor to solid middle class in 2-3 generations.

And I’d be happy to submit whatever kind of explanation I think might fit the facts of any situation, regardless of group.

[shanghaiaway]

Yep, no lack of authoritarian/machismo types in China.

[alfredallan1]

Nor any Asian country whose natives are perceived in the West as being meek/humble or whatever else.

It is just that most immigrants (in the last 3-4 decades) to the US happen to be a self selected group meeting certain stringent criteria of acheivement in one area, which left, in most cases, little room for a “broader” personality, i.e. high acheiving STEM grads.