NRIs face least crime, have higher education and income than the national average

Americans of Indian origin wealthiest; face least crime
Mar 27 2009, 2137 hrs IST , Washington
Tags: UCLA, News By AFP

Asians-American tend to have higher education and income than the national average, according to the latest statistical profile by the Asian-American Studies Center at the University of California-Los Angeles (UCLA).

The average Asian-American household earns 66,103 dollars a year, against a national average of 50,233, it said. But there were major differences within the community, with Americans of Indian origin the wealthiest.

Asian-Americans suffer less from violent crime than other racial groups in the United States, Justice Department figures have shown.

Some 11 out of 1,000 Asian-Americans aged 12 or older are the victims of non-fatal violent crimes each year, compared with 24 out of every 1,000 non-Asian Americans, according to statistics released on Wednesday.

In 2006, 360 Asian-Americans were murdered. They were victims of two percent of all US homicides, while accounting for about four percent of the population, the study found.

In one of the more striking differences among racial groups, strangers were responsible for most crime against Asian-Americans.

Seventy-seven percent of violent crimes against Asian-American men were committed by strangers, compared with 59 percent for non-Asians. Half of the crimes against Asian-American women were by people they did not know, compared with 34 percent for other women.

The government study did not delve into analysis. It defined Asian-Americans as those tracing their ethnicity to the Far East or the Indian subcontinent, as well as Native Hawaiians and Pacific Islanders.

Some Asian-American leaders have cautioned against the "model minority" image, noting that the community is diverse and some of its members are struggling.