In this chapter, I provide a theoretical and empirical overview of the entrepreneurial experience of Latino/as in the United States. In the first section, I discuss the traditional approach to ethnic enterprise. Next, I provide an exploratory investigation of self-employment among diverse Latino/a-origin groups. Because many of these Latino/a groups are recent migrants to the United States and/or their populations are small, this analysis serves as a preliminary “first look” at self-employment across distinct Latin American national-origin groups. Finally, although ethnic entrepreneurship among the Latino/a population overall remains understudied (with the exception of Cuban immigrants and their descendants), I present research that has explored the entrepreneurial and self-employment practices of the more traditional and larger Latino/a population in the United States.
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Keywords
- American Sociological Review
- Ethnic Economy
- Ethnic Entrepreneur
- Ethnic Group Membership
- Ethnic Entrepreneurship
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Valdez, Z. (2008). Latino/a Entrepreneurship in the United States: A Strategy of Survival and Economic Mobility. In: Rodríguez, H., Sáenz, R., Menjívar, C. (eds) Latinas/os in the United States: Changing the Face of América. Springer, Boston, MA. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-0-387-71943-6_11
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