True or False: "Hispanics Are Quickly Moving Up the Economic Ladder"

[The Cleaner]

I heard this last night on the news - they had a segment on how a Hispanic man worked his way up and now owns his own home.

Then I got to thinking...with companies using Hispanics as virtual slave labor, paying them diddly squat and offering no real benefits (financial or health), how the hell are they moving up the ladder of success? It seems to me that the companies have ensured the restriction of traditional lateral movement into higher paying jobs.

What gives?

Edit to add link and story (not the one I heard last night but a similiar one):

Ramos’ hard work, and Southland’s investment in him, is paying off. Ramos has settled comfortably into a typical middle-class American lifestyle since leaving Guatemala nearly two decades ago. A side benefit to those company-paid English classes: That is where he met his wife, a U.S. citizen who is originally from El Salvador. Today the couple own a house in the suburbs where they raise their three school-age children. Ramos occupies one of the more pivotal jobs at Southland, a medium-sized company that generated more than $60 million in projects in 2005. He sketches in the structural elements on blueprints that work crews use to build numerous projects along the Northern Virginia-Washington, D.C., corridor.

Source: http://www.virginiabusiness.com/magazine/yr2006/may06/construct1.shtml

[yourout]

1. As a whole......no. Individuals that are willing to exploit there own.

can do well in the Bush economy. You just can not have a sense of ethics.

[Nikia]

6. I think that is quite a generalization

One could just as easily say that whites who grew up on welfare only can succeed economically if they exploit other poor whites. There are many career oppurtunties that have little or nothing to do with exploiting anyone.

[lcordero2]

2. It's a con job I think

Do you have a link?

[silverweb]

3. It's very likely true for some.

However, it's very easy to make gross generalizations based on a few examples. Naturally, some will suceed and some will not. Only comprehensive, accurate data can give the proof of numbers and trends, though.

[XemaSab]

4. I would guess that it's true

Not for everyone, but for many.

Most of them come here at the absolute bottom, and their kids go to school and get better jobs.

Most of my Hispanic friends' parents are dirt poor, but the kids are doing okay. :shrug:

[Nikia]

5. Obviously it depends, I don't know the statistics

And there are probably several different ways to interpret the question and the statistics.
On an individual basis, it is true for some and not true for others just as it is for whites, blacks, Asians, and other Americans. Antedotal evidence is not a good measure of a trend though.