Economic Impacts of Immigration

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There are currently nearly 40 million foreign-born residents of the United States, and about 22 million of them are in the workforce. They constitute about 15 percent of the workforce. Immigrants have been arriving in the United States at a consistent rate of about 1.3 million per year over the past decade or so. Perhaps 10-11 million residents and 6-7 million workers are undocumented (or illegal) immigrants.

Over two-thirds of all immigrants reside in six states (CA, NY, TX, FL, NJ, and IL), though their concentrations in these states have been declining over time. Immigrant workers also concentrate quite heavily in a limited number of industries, such as agriculture, construction, accommodations, food preparation, and some nondurable manufacturing. Nearly 30 percent of immigrant workers are high school dropouts, but about a fourth are college graduates. Immigrants constitute large fractions of the current population of U.S. graduate students, especially in science and engineering.

Note: This testimony is available in its entirety in the Portable Document Format (PDF).

The nonpartisan Urban Institute publishes studies, reports, and books on timely topics worthy of public consideration. The views expressed are those of the authors and should not be attributed to the Urban Institute, its trustees, or its funders.

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