Convenience stores in my town...

 

I live in a town of 55 020 people of which 96% identify themselves as white
according to the 2006 census.  330 of the non-whites said they are Chinese,
45 said they are Korean, 130 said they are Japanese, 65 said they are
Southeast Asian.  50 said "Other race" and 110 said mixed race.  In other
other words this is one hell of a white flight town with very few
self-identifying oriental people.

Why then, out of the 2 dozen convience stores in town, are they all run by
Asians?  Did the federal government recruit highly successful East Asians
and asked them to set-up convenience stores here.  No complaints from me.
The stores I frequent all seem well kept, clean, well-stocked shelves, busy.
The loaves of bread are never past the best before dates, no dust on the
cans/shelves. I've seen two instances where they'll deny underage looking
kids cigarettes, a couple establishments even serve ice cream and have
generous scoop sizes.  Hell 3 or 4 of them sell live bait, and clean water
in the bait tanks.  None of them have gas stations, but that's a town law I
think.

But how is it that they are all Asian operated and run?

Which brings me to my next point:  Why is it the 2 dozen or so pizza places
in town are all Indian and Pakistani operated?

 

Easy, start one of your own.

Report back in six months.


The Henchman wrote:

 



It's not so easy to start a business in America, unless you have alot
of  money to put down and an infrastructure in place, whereby someone
helping you has already started and run the same business.

Try to get a small business loan on your own. Good luck. I've tried.
Impossible. But, as a Chinese-American friend once told me, "the
reason the chinese can come into the smallest town in America and open
a chinese restaurant in two days is they all work together in Chinese
gangs to pool money and finangle through all the government
regulations." That's it. Foreigners have money from other foreigners
and have the gang-lawyer, corporate shill, to open and buy these
businesses. They are not starting from scratch hoping a bank will lend
them money. Before they come over to America, they know where they're
going to work, it's set up through the gang.

Americans don't open businesses, unless daddy owns it. We just go to
college.

 

On Sat, 13 Mar 2010, The Henchman wrote:


Convenience stores are just that, convenient.  They are not one bit
frugal.

In both cases, they are businesses that people can buy into, get autonomy
and maybe use the kids as cheaper labor.  They are also likely businesses
that a lot of other people aren't interested in.  If they have more money,
or their fancy diploma from home is recognized when coming to America,
they will likely pursue other things.

Note that if you go far enough back, it was the same story, the only
difference being which type of recent immigrant was running the store.
Isaac Asimov spent a lot of time in his father's candy store (which really
translates to "convenience store", and they immigrated to the US from
Russia when he was very young.  The hours were long, but it beat working
for someone else.  The father could rope in the kids to do small jobs and
then later work shifts, without having to pay employees. Isaac went to
university, became a "distinguished man of science" and well known science
fiction writer.  Maybe it would have taken a generation, or more, to get
there if his father had worked in a factory or something, rather than
be an entrepreneur.

   Michael

 

The Henchman wrote:


are Southeast Asian.  50 said "Other

Not a shred of evidence of any flight.


Asians?

Presumably its an area that they prefer to work in.


them to set-up convenience stores here.

Nope.


well-stocked shelves, busy. The loaves of

seen two instances where they'll deny

and have generous scoop sizes.  Hell 3

Presumably no one else is interested in that sort of operation.


town are all Indian and Pakistani

Maybe they have enough of a clue to realise that there is a market for pizzas
there.