Hispanic Disaggregation and Variation in Socioeconomic Mobility Markers

Sociological inquiry of race and ethnicity typically takes a monolithic approach when examining Hispanic populations. However, novel sources of big data could be used to generate more precise insights about stratification among Hispanic subgroups. To demonstrate this, we use disaggregated data from the US Census Bureau that contains the number of Hispanic people in each ZIP code in the United States broken down by their regional origin (country or territory), along with ZIP code level data of economic connectedness, a strong predictor of socioeconomic mobility created using digital data from social media. Our results show Hispanics of Mexican, Central American, Puerto Rican, Dominican, and Cuban origin tend to live in areas with less economic connectedness than Hispanics of South American and Spanish origin, trends which mirror the overall trends discussed in the current literature. These latter groups, in some cases, have higher indicators of economic connectedness than the average American, Hispanic or not. Better understanding of the nuances among the coherent ethnic subgroups that fall under the panethnic Hispanic umbrella has implications for our understanding of social inequality.