Why Canada has proportionally more Asian-descent people than most western countries?

[Capsicum]

If you look at most western countries, Canada has many more people of Asian descent (combining East and South Asians, whether or not you include the Middle East, though that definitely adds to it too). Canada is around 15% Asian descent, depending on how you count West Asians.

The US is only about 5-6% Asian and Britain (mostly South Asian) I think is also in the single-digit percentages.

Europe and Latin America has little Asian immigration (though places like Peru and Brazil did in the past).

The closest would be Australia and NZ. Australia seems to have 12-16% which is on par with Canada. New Zealand is also around the same ballpark at 11%.

Geography doesn't explain all of it. The US has much more Latin American immigration than Asian immigration historically and this has only recently changed. However, Canada is not closer to the Asia-Pacific area than the US (if anything the US is closer, due to Hawaii plus islands like Guam, as well as a long history of military presence in East Asia).

Australia and NZ are much, much closer to Asia but still only come to matching or equal Canadian Asian populations as a percentage of the populace. If geography was a big influence, you'd expect Aus/NZ to have much more.

Also like many western countries, Canada did also restrict Asian immigration in the 20th century, but the period of restriction for Canada was shorter I believe than for the US (eg. the US restricted Chinese immigration from the 19th century onwards to the postwar period, while Canada had a shorter period of restriction plus a head tax which could still allow those who paid to arrive, even if they deterred many).

So, the difference is probably mostly post 1960s, but even early on in the 20th century, I think Canada already started having some group of Asians or another be the largest visible minority (by proportion, even if it was tiny in absolute terms and concentrated in BC), alongside Black Canadians (who were more in the east, at least around Ontario and Nova Scotia).

It just seems notable that probably either Canada or Australia has the most "Asian" population of the major Anglophone nations in the western world, though you can make a case for Trinidad/Guyana who have evenly split populations of South Asians and African descended peoples if you count the Caribbean as western.

[FrankieFlowerpot]

Ease up on the thread starting there buddy

[mistercorporate]

Canada/Aus/NZ use a points based immigration system, and Asia has the highest population of educated people willing to emigrate.

[Docere]

Small population, late start, liberal immigration policy, doesn't border Mexico.

[Capsicum]

It would be interesting to compare historical populations between Canada and Australia.

"In nineteenth-century Australia the Chinese, mainly from Kwangtung
province in the south, remained the major Asian-Pacific group.
Reaching a peak of 38,500 in the 1880s, and still numbering over 29,000
in 1901, they were settled in every colony, gradually abandoning golddigging
for bush-clearing, vegetable gardening, carpentry, and trade;
and in Sydney and Melbourne they were establishing small but noticeable
Chinatowns."

From the source:

Price, Charles. 'Asian and Pacific Island Peoples of Australia' in Fawcett, James T and Cariño, Benjamin V. Pacific Bridges: The New Immigration From Asia and the Pacific Islands. New York: Centre for Migration Studies (1987), p. 176

Canada had around 17 000 Chinese in 1901, so Australia had more than Canada during the gold rush era and points after.

The same source also gives 10, 000 Pacific Islanders, and just under 5000 Indians, in Australia in 1901, with Japanese more than 3500, Malay peoples at 1500 and Filipinos at 1000.

These Asian Australians at the turn of the 20th century likely outnumbered their Canadian counterparts.

So, it appears that even before the modern wave (points-based) of immigration, Australia had proportionally more Asians than Canada.

The US has obviously more in absolute number (over 100, 000 Chinese alone during the turn of the 20th century) but as a percentage relatively speaking this was lower than Canada and Australia.

[Capsicum]

Australia had an even later start than Canada in becoming a nation, and more early Asian immigration (and geographically is closer), but Canada appears to have caught up or is on par.

But Australia doesn't really measure race in the same way as Americans or Canadians for visible minority (it's more inferred from birthplace and parents' birthplace data, plus reported "ancestry") so the numbers aren't fully comparable but currently they are both near 15% Asian.

[Docere]

Australia was also rather late in liberalizing its immigration policy.

[harls]

Why are you so inquisitive? Are you doing a thesis?

[saffronleaf]

Immigration policy. We have a points system and we speak English. Lots of educated Asians have some knowledge of English and try to immigrate to developed English-speaking countries.

The US has uniform per-country limits. This means there is a cap that applies to how many immigrants can come from any country, and that cap is uniform regardless of the population of that country.

This means that Peru is subject to the same cap that India is, even though India has a greater population than the entire New World. Same with China. As a result, it's pretty challenging for Indians and Chinese to immigrate to the US. They then look to places like Canada, Australia and NZ.

[Capsicum]

Originally Posted by saffronleaf

Immigration policy. We have a points system and we speak English. Lots of educated Asians have some knowledge of English and try to immigrate to developed English-speaking countries.

The US has uniform per-country limits. This means there is a cap that applies to how many immigrants can come from any country, and that cap is uniform regardless of the population of that country.

This means that Peru is subject to the same cap that India is, even though India has a greater population than the entire New World. Same with China. As a result, it's pretty challenging for Indians and Chinese to immigrate to the US. They then look to places like Canada, Australia and NZ.

True that the US has caps per country to make sure that the immigrants are evenly spread between countries of origin.

However, the actual stats are that the immigration is not really much more spread out between source countries than for Canada. Immigration from the largest source, Mexico, outnumbers the next several countries on the list. In Canada, while the largest three sources are all Asian (Philippines, India, China, in various order that have switched around in the last decade or so) for the past few years (plus the Syrians within the last two years), no immigrant source country makes up more than 10%.

Plus, the US has a larger share of family reunification immigrants than Canada, so if anything that would tend to concentrate immigrants among source countries (since you get families sponsoring those from the same country).

[Docere]

Originally Posted by Capsicum

True that the US has caps per country to make sure that the immigrants are evenly spread between countries of origin.

However, the actual stats are that the immigration is not really much more spread out between source countries than for Canada. Immigration from the largest source, Mexico, outnumbers the next several countries on the list. In Canada, while the largest three sources are all Asian (Philippines, India, China, in various order that have switched around in the last decade or so) for the past few years (plus the Syrians within the last two years), no immigrant source country makes up more than 10%.

Plus, the US has a larger share of family reunification immigrants than Canada, so if anything that would tend to concentrate immigrants among source countries (since you get families sponsoring those from the same country).

It's borders Mexico so of course it's going to be a major source of immigration.

The L.A. area has about 2 million Asians as there are people in Greater Vancouver. But then there's like 6 million Hispanics (the vast majority Mexican American) so the percentage isn't that high.

In other words, it doesn't have a problem attracting Asian immigrants, it just has a major immigrant source Canada doesn't have.

[kwoldtimer]

Originally Posted by frankieflowerpot

ease up on the thread starting there buddy

+1

[Capsicum]

Originally Posted by Docere

It's borders Mexico so of course it's going to be a major source of immigration.

The L.A. area has about 2 million Asians as there are people in Greater Vancouver. But then there's like 6 million Hispanics (the vast majority Mexican American) so the percentage isn't that high.

In other words, it doesn't have a problem attracting Asian immigrants, it just has a major immigrant source Canada doesn't have.

It's notable that geographical proximity is only partially important for some immigrant sources (eg. Mexico, Cuba, the Dominican Republic for the US).

Seems like immigration to Canada and Australia are much more driven by demand-side than supply side, with the points system.

Mexico is close to the US so it dominates the list of immigration sources. But Indonesia is the Asian nation closest to Australia and does not top the list of immigrants to that country.
Canada has probably little to no correlation at all with geographical distance and proximity in terms of ease of getting there, it's an example where the immigration appears all driven by selectivity and demand by the host country, with little supply side influence.

[Capsicum]

Originally Posted by Docere

It's borders Mexico so of course it's going to be a major source of immigration.

The L.A. area has about 2 million Asians as there are people in Greater Vancouver. But then there's like 6 million Hispanics (the vast majority Mexican American) so the percentage isn't that high.

In other words, it doesn't have a problem attracting Asian immigrants, it just has a major immigrant source Canada doesn't have.

The Greater Toronto area probably at this point can go toe-to-toe with any metro area in the US for Asian population if I'm recalling the census right.

[north 42]

Originally Posted by kwoldtimer

+1

+2 Every random thought doesn't need to be a new thread! I do like and appreciate him as a poster though

[Docere]

I really don't think there is some mystery yet to be uncovered here...

[isaidso]

Originally Posted by Docere

Small population, late start, liberal immigration policy, doesn't border Mexico.

Agree with all of that except for late start. Canada has been an immigrant nation right from the get go. We brought in 400,000 immigrants in 1913. Large scale immigration to Canada isn't a recent development.

[lio45]

Originally Posted by Capsicum

It's notable that geographical proximity is only partially important for some immigrant sources (eg. Mexico, Cuba, the Dominican Republic for the US).

Geographical proximity is a factor. Cultural proximity is a factor as well.

East Asians still mostly end up in the closest places (West Coast of Canada and the U.S., Singapore, Australia...) when they relocate for opportunities.

I'd say geographical proximity does matter.

[whatnext]

Originally Posted by saffronleaf

Immigration policy. We have a points system and we speak English. Lots of educated Asians have some knowledge of English and try to immigrate to developed English-speaking countries.

The US has uniform per-country limits. This means there is a cap that applies to how many immigrants can come from any country, and that cap is uniform regardless of the population of that country.

This means that Peru is subject to the same cap that India is, even though India has a greater population than the entire New World. Same with China. As a result, it's pretty challenging for Indians and Chinese to immigrate to the US. They then look to places like Canada, Australia and NZ.

In order to ensure we are getting truly diverse immigrants we should also institute a per country cap (in addition to our points based system).

[kwoldtimer]

Originally Posted by whatnext

In order to ensure we are getting truly diverse immigrants we should also institute a per country cap (in addition to our points based system).

If you do that, you are unlikely to meet global target numbers.