Socioeconomic Adaptation of Bangladeshi Immigrants in the United States

Despite the tremendous growth of Bangladeshi immigrants in the United States in recent decades, systematic research on their socioeconomic adaptation is lacking, and existing portraits of their socioeconomic attainment are contradictory. Using the pooled samples from the 2001–2019 American Community Surveys with a substantial sample size and various regression models, this study analyzes the socioeconomic adaptation of foreign-born Bangladeshis by focusing on the most common indicators—educational attainment, occupational status, self-employment, and income. The results reveal that, in general, Bangladeshi immigrants are well educated and include a significant proportion of professionals, managers, and other white-collar workers, but their average income is very low. The regression analyses show that many demographic, familial, assimilation, and socioeconomic factors contribute significantly to the socioeconomic adaptation of Bangladeshi immigrants. Our findings provide a new portrait of Bangladeshi immigrants’ socioeconomic adaptation in the U.S. based on the latest generalizable data and new evidence on the determinants of their socioeconomic adaptation. The findings also have significant implications for scholarship and policy.