Squeezed In and Squeezed Out of L.A.’s Koreatown

Los Angeles’s Koreatown is a sprawling and electric 2.7 square miles full of traditional Korean cook-at-your-table barbecue restaurants, tofu houses, spas and 24-hour karaoke joints. Revived in the late 1960s and 1970s with a wave of immigration from South Korea, Ktown is a mix of languages and cultures. Classic mid-20th century watering holes like the HMS Bounty, where an episode of Mad Men was filmed, mix with markets that draw Korean immigrants from across Southern California. More than an eighth of a million people — many of them Latino or Asian immigrants with little political power — are crammed into about 150 blocks between Downtown L.A. and Hollywood. Many live in cramped, subpar apartments they can barely afford because of a lopsided mismatch between wages and rents.