State Policy Liberalism, Nativity, and Disability Disparities among Midlife Asian Americans

• In Event: Racial and Ethnic Minorities Section Roundtables Session
  In Refereed Roundtable (90 minute): Table Six: Racial Experiences and Perspectives of Asian People and Asian Americans

Abstract

Despite being among the fastest-growing and most internally diverse populations in the United States, Asian Americans remain understudied in population health research, particularly with respect to how state policy environments shape disability outcomes across ethnic subgroups and nativity groups. This study addresses these gaps using the 2010–2019 American Community Survey, disaggregating the Asian American population into six origin groups with the largest immigrant presence in the U.S. (i.e., Chinese, Filipino, Indian, Japanese, Korean, and Vietnamese), comparing disability prevalence at the intersections of nativity and state of residence, and examining the role of state-level policies in shaping disability profiles. Using survey-weighted logistic regression models, findings reveal three interrelated patterns underscoring the necessity of disaggregated approaches to Asian American health. First, the nativity-disability relationship varies in both direction and magnitude across ethnic subgroups, with some populations displaying the expected immigrant health advantage and others exhibiting a reversal reflecting differences in occupational concentration and migration selectivity. Second, geographic variation in disability is substantially wider among U.S.-born than foreign-born Asian Americans, suggesting state institutional contexts differentially shape the two groups' health conditions. Third, across different state policy dimensions, U.S.-born Asian Americans exhibit significant disability reductions when living in a state with more liberal policies, while foreign-born counterparts show near-flat trajectories, indicating that structural barriers systematically limit immigrant access to policy benefits. These findings call for disaggregated analyses that attend to ethnic origin, nativity, and state context simultaneously, and highlight the urgent need to improve policy inclusivity for Asian American immigrants.

Authors

• Haowei Wang, Syracuse University

• Catherine Garcia, Syracuse University

• Yan Zhang, Texas State University

• Jeung Hyun Kim, Brown University

• Marc Anthony Garcia, Syracuse University