Anecdotally I definitely agree with you -- I'm Gen Z and most of my SWE friends from outside of work have very similar perspectives. Don't think anybody actually cares about their job beyond the money.
Even some of my more passionate friends from school have developed a lot of cynicism after companies they loved rescinded their full time offers
I think this is a big part of why I believed 6 in 10 to such a massive number -- I grew up in southern California and then moved to the Bay, and it feels like most people I knew either had parents who immigrated before they were born or they themselves moved to the area for school or work.
From the context of a black person in the US who grew up and went to school in a majority Asian (70%+) area:
My understanding is that many first-generation Asian immigrants in the US immigrate to the US through visa programs, which tend to select for highly motivated, educated people. This in turn leads to their children having better outcomes, including financial ones.
People who are generally better off financially tend to live in nicer areas, and those nicer areas are less policed. This tends to lead to a change of perception of a given group of people -- most Asian people they know are smart and well off, so they use that as a heuristic.
Many black people in the US are descendants of slaves who were brought to the US against their will and had very little access to property, leading to generational poverty. Poorer areas are generally policed more aggressively, leading to more crime being prosecuted, and thus a heuristic is built that leads to even more aggressive policing (eg. stop and frisk in NYC was very racist as a result).
I don't think there are any innate qualities that Asian people have that black people don't that would lead to Asian privilege, and the two groups face racism in different ways across the US. Asian people are victims of racism in different ways even if they generally aren't as targeted in policing.
Recommend reading more about the model minority concept as well, as from what I've seen from my Asian friends and loved ones, is a concept that places a lot of pressure on them. Holding up Asian people as an example of a minority that does really well or is expected to do really well can mitigate their own accomplishments.
About 30% of the New Zealand population is fairly recent immigrants, also usually with quite strict visa selection criteria, so there is a somewhat similar dynamic here.
Fifty per cent of the New Zealand prison population is Maori, even though they make up 15 per cent of the population, so there are parallels there too - their history is horrifying in other ways (especially because they were here first).
Even some of my more passionate friends from school have developed a lot of cynicism after companies they loved rescinded their full time offers