> He's not, it's the magical thinking "pulling yourself by your own bootstraps" when reality is that my kid is going to have a better outcome than the average Latino immigrant because both of his parents is college level educated, speak multiple languages and live in a well off zipcode, even though both me and his mother were poor back in Brazil.
If you compare two kids whose parents are at the 25th percentile economically, one whose parents are native born Americans and the other whose parents are Guatemalan, the Guatemalan kid is actually going do better as a grown up. And a Chinese kid will do better than both of them.
> And a Chinese kid will do better than both of them.
Speaking as someone who grew up in an area where Asian Americans were the majority, the average Chinese kid may ultimately fare better in terms of income, but may also have unresolved mental health issues steming from the crushing parental pressure in their childhood.
I know Asian Americans who are jealous about not having a permissive American-style upbringing. But in reality American kids just have different shit, like instability from parents getting divorced, or getting stuck at a dead end service job because nobody ever taught them to navigate the system.
America is brutal competition. Asian parenting at least prepares you for that.
If you compare two kids whose parents are at the 25th percentile economically, one whose parents are native born Americans and the other whose parents are Guatemalan, the Guatemalan kid is actually going do better as a grown up. And a Chinese kid will do better than both of them.