Koreans Earn More in U.S.

A recent study in Chosun Ilbo notes that over the past years the income of Koreans in the U.S. was higher than in Korea.

For example, the per-capita gross national income of Korean Americans in 1999 was 3.3 times higher than that of Koreans in their own country.

Kim Tae-gi, an economist at Chonnam National University, calculated the Korean-American economy based on various data including a 2000 U.S. census in an article for the Journal of Regional Development and Research. According to the research, per capita GNI of Korean Americans in 1999 was $28,095, more than three times the figure for Korea.

Koreans in San Francisco had the highest per-capita income with $38,258, 4.49 times more than their stay-at-home brethren. The per-capita GNI in Los Angeles was below the U.S. average with $27,536. Seattle was the city where Koreans earned the least money.

Unrelated to the study, Korean Americans are among the most entrepreneurial of all groups in the U.S.--in fact 1/3 own their own small businesses.