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Old 12-15-2012, 06:27 PM
 
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Everyone knows that the West Coast has the bulk of the Asians in the United States, except for South Asians. On the East Coast and nearly everywhere else, there is a South Asian population there, but on the West Coast, its considerably more muted.

Why is that the case?
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Old 12-15-2012, 07:13 PM
 
Location: The western periphery of Terra Australis
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Can you show some stats to back up what you're saying?

I'm sure cities like Seattle, SF, LA have sizable S.Asian populations compared to say, Oklahoma City or Duluth. I mean aren't a lot of people working in Silicon Valley Asian, whether East Asians or South Asians (including Asian Americans)?
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Old 12-15-2012, 07:58 PM
 
Location: Northridge, Los Angeles, CA
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Just for California:

2011 United States One Year Estimates (American FactFinder)

United States South Asian Total (Asian Indian, Bangladeshi, Bhutanese, Nepalese, Sri Lankan): 3,887,217
California South Asian total: 714,071 (18.4% of South Asians live in CA, while 11.9% of Americans live in CA)

South Asians in California are way more heavily represented in Northern California than Southern California due to the influence of Silicon Valley and the more long term settlement of Punjab Sikhs in more inland NorCal cities like Yuba City, Livingston, Delhi, etc. In fact, California elected its 2nd South Asian congressional member this past November (Ami Bera), representing the Sacramento suburbs.

SoCal has a somewhat decent South Asian population (especially in places like Artesia), but not that huge of a community here. However, as time goes on, their presence in SoCal has been growing more and more.
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Old 12-15-2012, 08:14 PM
 
Location: Willowbend/Houston
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Are you kidding?

The Bay Area has the 2nd largest Indian community in the US after NYC.

Admittedly the Indian community in Southern California is small given its size, but still big overall.
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Old 12-15-2012, 08:22 PM
 
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Seattle has a large Indian population. Many came with H1B visas (iirc) to work in the software fields and engineering companies.
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Old 12-15-2012, 10:34 PM
 
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Trimac20 View Post
Can you show some stats to back up what you're saying?

I'm sure cities like Seattle, SF, LA have sizable S.Asian populations compared to say, Oklahoma City or Duluth. I mean aren't a lot of people working in Silicon Valley Asian, whether East Asians or South Asians (including Asian Americans)?
Compared to the East Coast, the South Asian population isn't nearly as strong on the West Coast.

Indian Americtan Leadership Council

New York Metro area alone has 526,133 Indians, while California as a whole has 528,176 Indians.

Every state from Virginia to Massachusetts has more than 75,000 Indian people, while Washington has only 61,124 Indians and Oregon has 16,740 Indian.

This isn't counting the Pakistani, Bangladeshi, Nepalese, Sri Lankan, and other South Asian populations.

However, the West Coast seems to be strong in every other Asian category. I just find it interesting that South Asians aren't as strong in number out there.
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Old 12-16-2012, 12:12 AM
 
Location: The western periphery of Terra Australis
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Goodjobgoodeffort View Post
Compared to the East Coast, the South Asian population isn't nearly as strong on the West Coast.

Indian Americtan Leadership Council

New York Metro area alone has 526,133 Indians, while California as a whole has 528,176 Indians.

Every state from Virginia to Massachusetts has more than 75,000 Indian people, while Washington has only 61,124 Indians and Oregon has 16,740 Indian.

This isn't counting the Pakistani, Bangladeshi, Nepalese, Sri Lankan, and other South Asian populations.

However, the West Coast seems to be strong in every other Asian category. I just find it interesting that South Asians aren't as strong in number out there.
Another reason could be geography. If you only talk the northern hemisphere the PNW is about as far away from India as you can get. It's a lot closer for Asians from the Pacific Rim nations to get there.
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Old 12-16-2012, 05:09 AM
 
Location: Willowbend/Houston
13,384 posts, read 25,618,278 times
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Goodjobgoodeffort View Post
Compared to the East Coast, the South Asian population isn't nearly as strong on the West Coast.

Indian Americtan Leadership Council

New York Metro area alone has 526,133 Indians, while California as a whole has 528,176 Indians.

Every state from Virginia to Massachusetts has more than 75,000 Indian people, while Washington has only 61,124 Indians and Oregon has 16,740 Indian.

This isn't counting the Pakistani, Bangladeshi, Nepalese, Sri Lankan, and other South Asian populations.

However, the West Coast seems to be strong in every other Asian category. I just find it interesting that South Asians aren't as strong in number out there.
Again, the Bay Area has the second largest Indian community in the US. How that isn't strong is beyond me.
LA, Sacramento, and Seattle also have large Indian communities.
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Old 12-16-2012, 08:47 AM
 
Location: Victoria TX
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Immigrants often arrive with some personal acquaintances already in place, and consequently, settle in areas where they already know somebody, or where there is already a support group to help people of their nationality assimilate. That phenomenon largely accounts for concentrations of certain ethnicities in isolated areas.

For example, in my part of Texas, there is a very high representation of people with Czech ancestry. Czechs simply followed other Czechs to the same areas as newcomers arrived. There is nothing about the hot, flat desert plains of south Texas that would be particularly attractive to someone from the Bohemian forests, this just happened to be where an influential pioneer group gained a successful foothold and attracted other of like culture when they arrived bewildered and seeking some anchor of familiarity. Similarly, the town I grew up in in Wisconsin was dominated by a Dutch presence, as more and more Dutch immigrants settled in communities that already had a Dutch presence. So it is not surprising that there are a lot more Czechs than Dutch where I live now, but a lot more Dutch than Czechs where I grew up.
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Old 12-16-2012, 09:33 AM
 
11 posts, read 21,768 times
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Trimac20 View Post
Another reason could be geography. If you only talk the northern hemisphere the PNW is about as far away from India as you can get. It's a lot closer for Asians from the Pacific Rim nations to get there.
But the Vancouver area has a large Indian population for its size and it's even further than the PNW than Oregon, Washington, and California.

So that can't be the explanation.

Quote:
Again, the Bay Area has the second largest Indian community in the US. How that isn't strong is beyond me.
LA, Sacramento, and Seattle also have large Indian communities.
I guess the question of my thread is why isn't the South Asian population as strong on the West Coast relative to other Asian populations, as opposed to Chinese, Filipinos, Vietnamese, Koreans, etc. etc.
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