Cultural fluency required? Interrogating ethnocentrism in the employment of white-collar Asian migrants in Japan.

This article examines whether Japanese firms apply ethnocentric evaluation and reward criteria to white-collar foreign workers by comparing earnings of Asian migrants educated in Japan versus those educated abroad. Contrary to prevailing scholarly assumptions that foreign-educated migrants face labor market penalties due to lower assimilation with Japanese work norms, the study finds that foreign-educated migrants earn significantly more than their Japan-educated counterparts, even after controlling for factors such as language ability, university prestige, job type, and firm characteristics. These results suggest that Japanese firms may be less ethnocentric in their economic evaluations and rewards than commonly believed, valuing skills brought by foreign-educated workers beyond assimilation. The study highlights a potential disconnect between ethnocentric pressures in training and assimilation and actual wage outcomes, and calls for further research on hiring practices and firm-level differences.