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Background: Economic inequality in the United States is extreme, but little is known about the national origin of affluent households. Households in the top one percent by total wealth own vastly disproportionate quantities of household assets and have correspondingly high levels of economic, social, and political influence. The overrepresentation of white natives (i.e., those born in the U.S.) among high-wealth households is well-documented, but changing migration dynamics suggest that a growing portion of top households may be immigrants. Methods: Because no single survey dataset contains top wealth holders and data about country of origin, this paper uses two publicly-available data sets: the Survey of Consumer Finances (SCF) and the Survey of Income and Program Participation (SIPP). Multiple imputation is used to impute country of birth from the SIPP into the SCF. Descriptive statistics are used to demonstrate reliability of the method, to estimate the prevalence of immigrants among top wealth holders, and to document patterns of asset ownership among affluent immigrants. Results: Significant numbers of top wealth holders who are usually classified as white natives may be immigrants. Many top wealth holders appear to be European and Canadian immigrants, and increasing numbers of top wealth holders are likely from Asia and Latin America as well. Results suggest that of those in the top one percent of wealth holders, approximately 3% are European and Canadian immigrants, .5% are from Mexico or Cuban, and 1.7% are from Asia (especially Hong Kong, Taiwan, Mainland China, and India). Ownership of key assets varies considerably across affluent immigrant groups. Conclusion: Although the percentage of top wealth holders who are immigrants is relatively small, these percentages represent large numbers of households with considerable resources and corresponding social and political influence. Evidence that the propensity to allocate wealth to real and financial assets varies across immigrant groups suggests that wealth ownership is more global than previous research suggests and that immigrant groups are likely to become more prevalent in top wealth positions in the U.S. As the representation of immigrants in top wealth positions grows, their economic, social, and political influence is likely to increase as well. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Chinese immigrants are a diverse and growing group whose members provide a unique opportunity to examine within-immigrant group differences in adaptation. In this paper, we move beyond thinking of national-origin groups as homogenous and study variation among Chinese immigrants in wealth ownership, a critical indicator of adaptation that attracts relatively little attention in the immigration literature. We develop an analytical approach that considers national origin, tenure in the U.S., and age to examine heterogeneity in economic adaptation among the immigrant generation. Our results show that variations among Chinese immigrants explain within-group differences in net worth, asset ownership, and debt. These differences also account for important variation between Chinese immigrants, natives, and other immigrant groups and provide important, new insight into the processes that lead to immigrant adaptation and long-term class stability. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]