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Where and Why Do People Move? Crash Course Geography #32

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How to deal with culture shock and immigration

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How to deal with culture shock and immigration

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How To Deal With Culture Shock & Immigration

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My Story of Immigration | Miriam Martinez | TEDxCarverMilitaryAcademy

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Between Two Cultures | Smrithi Ram | TEDxUCincinnati

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Why The U.S. Won’t Put Immigrants To Work

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Immigrants, the multi-culture, and the search for authenticity

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Immigrants, the multi-culture, and the search for authenticity

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Immigrants, the multi-culture, and the search for authenticity | Hamza Haq | TEDxToronto

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Why Do People Migrate Away From Their Home Country?

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Why Do People Migrate Away From Their Home Country?

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Why Do People Migrate Away From Their Home Country?

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It Wasn't Easy Growing Up As An Immigrant

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It Wasn't Easy Growing Up As An Immigrant

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It Wasn't Easy Growing Up As An Immigrant

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How a restaurant is helping diners think deeply about immigrant culture and food

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Proud Daughter of Immigrants from Mexico

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Proud Daughter of Immigrants from Mexico

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Proud Daughter of Immigrants from Mexico | Jessica Hinojos | TEDxYouth@ParkCity

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How US immigration laws and rules have changed through history

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How US immigration laws and rules have changed through history

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How U.S. immigration laws and rules have changed through history

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The United States began regulating immigration soon after it won independence from Great Britain, and the laws since enacted have reflected the politics and migrant flows of the times. We looked at key immigration laws from 1790 to 2014.

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Four Ways We Can Improve Our Immigration System

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Four Ways We Can Improve Our Immigration System

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Over the past several months, Americans have been inundated with news and imagery from the U.S.-Mexico border. As policies have shifted, historically high numbers of people have arrived, including many intending to seek asylum in the United States.

People often ask me how we, as Christians, should respond to stories like these. We want to fix the problem and end the suffering, but, sadly, hard policy problems like asylum and refugee resettlement are much more complicated than the "easy fixes" hinted at in the headlines.

For one, the U.S. is particularly unprepared for this influx of people seeking refuge because our immigration system has been essentially dismantled over the last several years - both as a result of intentional policy decisions and by the COVID-19 pandemic - and it is taking time to rebuild it. We and our network of faith-based and community organizations are eager to partner with the government to care for vulnerable people, but currently lack the resources and workforce to handle this surge.

Nonetheless, the country is bound by various international treaties and domestic laws to give a hearing to particular categories of migrants, including unaccompanied children and anyone facing a credible fear of persecution. We cannot abandon either these national commitments or our celebrated heritage as a place of opportunity and new beginnings for those seeking refuge.

We need to seek change. A fair and humane solution to immigration policy and asylum issues will take time, patience, funding and focused political attention. Here are four ways we can change our immigration system in a comprehensive and humane way.

1. We must address the root causes driving asylum seekers to come to the U.S. in the first place.

Along with many Americans motivated by personal faith and the best of our national values, we are eager to welcome those who seek refuge in the U.S. But that eagerness is paired with lament; we grieve that anyone would feel they had no choice but to leave their homes and their countries of origin.

The factors that push people to flee countries such as Venezuela, Haiti, Cuba, Honduras, El Salvador and Guatemala include poverty, high rates of violent crime, environmental degradation and corruption. Finding themselves in grim circumstances, families make what is often a heart-wrenching decision to flee their homes for a better life.

The United States can first address the rise in asylum cases by working with other governments and organizations to make home for refugees a safe place, rather than a dangerous one. This can be done through diplomatic negotiations with governments and financial support for local and international NGOs working to create opportunity and improve safety for families. By being more proactive in this effort and increasing both U.S. governmental aid as well as churches, businesses and individuals stepping up their support, fewer families will feel compelled to make the journey to the southern border.

2. We can increase resources for processing asylum claims as a means of disincentivizing unlawful entry into the country.

Because legal asylum claims often take too long to find a legal hearing, many individuals cross the border illegally in the hopes that they will be apprehended and then given the hearing to which they are legally entitled. We can bring order to the border simply by investing in the right kinds of resources. If we can fairly and efficiently handle the rising volume of asylum claims, we can divert asylum seekers away from dangerous border crossings and to lawful ports of entry.

3. We can increase orderly, legal migration options accessible closer to home.

Most people who make a dangerous journey to the border do so because that's the only way to lawfully request asylum. But if there was an option to request protections closer to home, either at a nearby U.S. consulate or in a neighboring country, most people would much prefer to reach safety in the U.S. via an airplane flight after being processed and vetted overseas. In fact, that's basically the model of the U.S. refugee resettlement program, which has been functioning well for decades. For those fleeing poverty, not persecution, additional employer-sponsored visas would also create increased opportunities for lawful migration - while helping to address a stark labor shortage within the U.S. that is fueling inflation and economic stagnation.

4. We need bipartisan action by Republicans and Democrats in Congress.

While expanding refugee resettlement could be done by executive action, many other changes to the legal immigration system - such as facilitating legal immigration options for those fleeing poverty and seeking to fill needs in the U.S. labor market - would require congressional action. Those changes could be paired with a host of other reforms to our immigration laws. Immigration reform, however, will require bipartisan cooperation between the new administration and both political parties. Securing bipartisan cooperation now can ensure we move beyond quick fixes and make lasting changes for years to come.

We need to invest in better immigration policies that can spur economic growth, protect our national security and offer comfort to the vulnerable. But change will not happen overnight. Our short-term efforts to alleviate suffering should not come at the expense of the broader reforms needed for an effective-and more humane-immigration policy.

I encourage you to educate yourself about some of the pressing issues surrounding immigration policies, lean into hard conversations and risk feeling uncomfortable. Together, we can raise our voices in support of those whose voices are often ignored, marginalized or overlooked. We can be advocates for those fleeing violence, poverty and oppression and respond to their cries for help - just as our heavenly Father listens and responds to us.
To stay informed about issues related to immigration, mass displacement, extreme poverty and more, sign up for our monthly newsletter or subscribe for advocacy alerts! This blog was originally published on July 8th, 2021 and was recently updated on May 26th 2023.

Scott Arbeiter retired from World Relief in 2021 as president after serving the organization in various roles for more than two decades and is a former pastor of Elmbrook Church in Brookfield, Wisconsin.

Matt Soerens began his World Relief journey in 2005 as an intern in Nicaragua and now serves as the VP of Advocacy and Policy. Since then he served as a Department of Justice-accredited legal counselor in Chicagoland before assuming the role of U.S. Director of Church Mobilization and Advocacy. Matt is the co-author of three books including Welcoming the Stranger (InterVarsity Press, 2018) and Inalienable (InterVarsity Press, 2022). Matt also serves as the National Coordinator for the Evangelical Immigration Table, a coalition that advocates for immigration reforms consistent with biblical values. He is a graduate of Wheaton College, where he has also served as a guest faculty member in the Humanitarian & Disaster Leadership program, and earned a master's degree from DePaul University's School of Public Service. He lives in Aurora, Illinois with his wife Diana and their four children.

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Four Ways We Can Improve Our Immigration System

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Over the past several months, Americans have been inundated with news and imagery from the U.S.-Mexico border. As policies have shifted, historically high

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January 20
Donald J. Trump is inaugurated as the 45th president.

later declared January 25 Setting ICE loose:
Trump signs Executive Order 13768 to punish sanctuary cities and sets up an office to track crimes by immigrants. (The order's provisions regarding sanctuary cities are unconstitutional.) Trump also signs Executive Order 13767 calling for the "immediate construction" of his long-promised border wall. (Building the wall requires congressional approval.)

immediately January 27 Travel Ban 1.0:
Executive Order 13769 is almost blocked by numerous federal judges.

February 13 RAISE Act is introduced in the Senate:
The bill seeks to limit the number of immigrants admitted to the US. (The bill, opposed by Democrats - who will control the House in 2019 - is unlikely to pass.)

March 6 Travel Ban 2.0:
Executive Order 13780 is announced. The Supreme Court allows the order to go into effect temporarily.

June 15 Deferred Action for Parents of Americans is rescinded:
An Obama-era plan to shield millions of undocumented parents from deportation was stalled in the courts before implementation - and the Trump administration rescinded it. An estimated 3.6 million people would have been eligible, according to the Migration Policy Institute.

September 5
Attorney General Jeff Sessions announces the repeal of Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals, affecting nearly 690,000 people. The repeal is blocked by federal courts after 15 states and the District of Columbia file a lawsuit.

September 12 Clearing the way for the wall:
DHS announces it will waive "certain laws" to begin construction of the new wall near Calexico, California. The first section of fence was dedicated on Oct. 26, 2018.

September 24 Travel Ban 3.0:
Presidential Proclamation 9645 is announced, adding Venezuela and North Korea to the list of affected countries, making it not exclusively a ban on Muslims. The Supreme Court would uphold the ban on June 26, 2018.

October 31
Sayfullo Saipov, an immigrant from Uzbekistan who entered the US under a special visa program, kills 8 and injures 11 on a Manhattan bike path in a terror attack.

Section 9(a) of November 20
Executive Order 13768 - withholding federal grants to sanctuary cities - is declared unconstitutional.

2017 ICE Stats*

143,470
administrative arrests

226,119
interior and border removals

Customs and Border Protection

250,838
apprehensions made at the southwest border

*ICE statistics based on fiscal year 2017, which includes the final four months of Obama's administration.

January 8
The US ends temporary protected status for 195,000 Salvadorans and 50,000 Haitians.

February 23 Trump's statement (determined to be false) at the Conservative Political Action Conference in Oxon Hill, Maryland:
"This guy came in through chain migration and a part of the lottery system. They say 22 people came in with him. In other words, an aunt, an uncle, a grandfather, a mother, a father, whoever came in. But a lot of people came in. That's chain migration."

Late March
A caravan of more than 1,000 people, mostly from Honduras, begins its journey to the US from Tapachula, Mexico.

April 2
The Justice Department announces quotas for immigration judges to complete cases faster. The Trump administration says it expects 700 cases completed with a 15% appeal rate each year.

April 4
As the caravan continues toward the US, Trump signs a memo to deploy "anywhere from 2,000 to 4,000 " National Guard troops to the US-Mexico border.

April 6 Making zero-tolerance official:
Attorney General Jeff Sessions directs federal prosecutors "to adopt immediately a zero-tolerance policy for all offenses" related to the misdemeanor of illegal entry to the US.

June 11
Attorney General Jeff Sessions says domestic violence is not grounds for asylum:
"Generally, claims by aliens pertaining to domestic violence or gang violence perpetrated by non-governmental actors will not qualify for asylum."

June 14 Tent city becomes operational:
The Department of Health and Human Services says it received grant funds of $15 million for 30 days to detain children separated from parents at the border in a tent city near Tornillo, Texas.

June 20 Family separation policy reversed:
Trump signs an abruptly drafted executive order to keep detained immigrant families together.

June 26 Travel Ban 3.0 is upheld by the Supreme Court:
Writing for the court's 5-4 majority, Chief Justice John Roberts says Trump has authority under the Immigration and Nationality Act to "suspend entry of aliens into the United States."

September 14
The tent city in Tornillo, Texas, begins expanding to 3,800 beds after the Office of Refugee Resettlement announces up to $368 million in additional funds to expand capacity and keep the shelter running through 2018.

October 3
A federal judge stops the Trump administration from ending temporary protected status for Sudan, Haiti, El Salvador, and Nicaragua.

October 30
Trump says he intends to end birthright citizenship.

November 25
US border officers shoot tear gas and pepper balls at asylum-seekers at the Tijuana border crossing.

December 11
The Trump administration asks the Supreme Court to let the federal government bar asylum claims by people entering the country without authorization.

December 12
The Atlantic reports: "The Trump administration is resuming its efforts to deport certain protected Vietnamese immigrants who have lived in the United States for decades-many of them having fled the country during the Vietnam War."

December 13
Customs and Border Protection acknowledges that a 7-year-old girl died Dec. 8 just hours after she was taken into custody by Border Patrol agents in New Mexico.

December 22 The US Government Partially Shuts Down:
The Senate unanimously passes a bill to fund to the government, however because it lacks the $5.7 billion needed to fund a border wall, the bill is not taken up by the Republican-controlled House.
Approximately 800,000 government employees are either working without pay or were placed on unpaid leave.

2018 ICE Stats

158,581
administrative arrests

256,085
interior and border removals

Customs and Border Protection

415,868
apprehensions made at the southwest border ( through November)

January 3
Democrats take over the House of Representatives and immediately pass a bill to fund the government, which the Senate refuses to vote on.

January 8
In a television address, Trump is expected to make a case for a national security crisis at the southwest border and the necessity of building a wall to separate the US and Mexico.

Sources: ICE detention statistics from ice.gov; CPB apprehension data courtesy cpb.gov; immigration statistics courtesy National Immigration Forum. Photo credits: Getty Images: Inauguration, ICE, Sessions, Trump; Border wall: Mark Ralston / AFP / Getty Images; Caravan: Luc Forsyth for BuzzFeed News; Family separation: John Moore / Getty Images; Tent city: Mike Blake / Reuters; Second caravan: Jorge Cabrera / Reuters; Tear gas: Kim Kyung-Hoon / Reuters

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Trump's Presidency Has Brought Two Years Of Immigration Turmoil

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A lot has happened in two years. Here's a summary.

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Trump's anti-immigrant comments draw rebuke

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Trump's anti-immigrant comments draw rebuke

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international relations and national security

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Trump's anti-immigrant comments draw rebuke | CNN Politics

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Former President Donald Trump said in a recent interview that undocumented immigrants were "poisoning the blood of our country," using language that is often employed by White supremacists and nativists in comments that have drawn rebuke from one prominent civil rights group.

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7 Things That Would Fix Immigration in the U.S.

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Democrats need to go on offense to win on immigration, write John Austin and Steve Tobocman.

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LGBTQ+ Immigrants Targeted in Louisiana ICE Facilities

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LGBTQ+ Immigrants Targeted in Louisiana ICE Facilities

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No Hope for Redemption, LGBTQ+ immigrants targeted in Louisiana ICE facilities, advocates say

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AP fact check: Trump plays on immigration myths

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AP fact check: Trump plays on immigration myths

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AP fact check, Trump plays on immigration myths

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/ MoneyWatch

Immigrants are apparently getting the job done, with new government data finding that almost 1 in 5 workers last year were born outside the U.S. to parents who aren't American citizens, representing a record-high share of the workforce.

That reverses a pandemic dip, when the share of foreign-born workers slipped - an unusual backstep in a trend that's been rising since at least 1996. The share of immigrants in the workforce rose to 18.1% last year, an increase from 17.4% in 2021, the Bureau of Labor Statistics said in a recent report.

The findings come at a time when immigration is in the spotlight due to the expiration of Title 42, an emergency immigration restriction that allowed the U.S. to expel hundreds of thousands of migrants to Mexico or their home countries due to the pandemic. Meanwhile, some states, like Texas and , are moving forward with new laws to crack down on immigration.

Previous dip coincided with labor shortage

But some economists have argued that the dip in immigration during the pandemic was, in fact, one of the causes of the labor-market tightness during the past few years. That coincided with two other demographic trends that are squeezing the pool of available workers: baby boomers retiring in force and a shrinking American birth rate.

"[P]olicies that encourage immigration, female labor participation or the uptake of new, productivity-enhancing technologies will determine the extent and persistence of labor supply challenges," Moody's said in a recent research note. "Without them, we would expect hiring challenges to re-emerge in the next business cycle."

Immigration rebounded last year, according to U.S. Census data, which found that the nation experienced the biggest single-year increase in immigrants since 2010. About 1 million people immigrated to the U.S. in 2022, a surge from its recent low of 376,000 people in 2021, the agency noted.

Here's what to know about the trend.

What is the jobless rate for foreign-born workers?

Employees who were born outside the U.S. had a lower jobless rate last year than native-born workers, the BLS said.

Foreign-born workers had an unemployment rate of 3.4% in 2022, compared with 3.7% for people born in the U.S., it noted.

The biggest difference was among men, with about 77% of immigrant male workers over the age of 16 in the workforce, compared with 66% of those born in America, the analysis found.

What kind of jobs do immigrants hold?

Foreign-born workers are more likely than those born in the U.S. to work in service industry jobs, natural resources, construction and maintenance jobs, the government said. They're also more likely to work in production, transportation and material moving jobs.

By comparison, American-born workers are more likely to work in management and professional jobs.

How much do foreign-born workers earn?

Workers born outside the U.S. earn a median wage of $945 per week, slightly less than the $1,087 per week earned by America-born employees, the analysis found.

What are the demographics of foreign-born workers?

Almost one-half of this group are Hispanic, while another roughly 25% are Asian, the labor department said. Another 16% is White, and about 10% is black, it noted.

Immigrant workers tend to have lower educational attainment, with the analysis finding that 18.3% of foreign-born workers last year hadn't earned a high school diploma, compared with 3.4% for U.S.-born employees.

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Immigrants are now a record share of U.S. workers. Here's what to know.

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Almost 1 in 5 workers are now foreign-born, reversing a pandemic decline when immigration slowed.

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How has immigration changed in the last 100 years?

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How has immigration changed in the last 100 years?

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How Has Immigration Changed in the Last 100 Years

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Today, more than 40 million people living in the U.S. were born in another country, accounting for about one-fifth of the world’s migrants.

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Immigrants remain more likely than U.S.-born workers to work in lower-skill occupations. But the share of immigrants in high-skill, nonmechanical jobs has risen in recent decades, according to a new Pew Research Center analysis of federal government data. The shift has been most notable in jobs that prioritize analytical skills, such as science and math, or fundamental skills, such as writing and speaking. A rising share of immigrants also work in jobs in which social skills like negotiation and persuasion are important.

Within this broad overall pattern, there are key differences between immigrant groups. Hispanic immigrants - by far the largest group of immigrant workers - are for the most part employed in lower-skill occupations. Asian immigrants - the largest bloc of new arrivals - work principally in higher-skill occupations. The distribution of skills among black immigrants falls between these two extremes, whereas white immigrant workers are spread across high-skill jobs like their Asian counterparts.

Overall, the share of immigrants in the U.S. labor force has increased sharply in recent decades, from 10% in 1995 to 17% in 2018. Immigrants are also expected to play the primary role in the growth of the country's workforce through 2035.

The American workplace has seen a rising need for high-skill workers in recent decades. This analysis examines how different groups of immigrant workers have increasingly fulfilled this demand, yet still trail behind their U.S.-born counterparts.

The numbers reported are derived from job skills and preparation data from the U.S. Department of Labor's Occupational Information Network (O*NET), specifically Version 23, released August 2018. O*NET analysts rate the importance of 35 skills related to job performance in individual occupations. For the purposes of this analysis, we grouped these into five major families of job skills: social, fundamental, analytical, managerial and mechanical. Occupations were then assigned to one of four skill tiers based on the importance rating of each of the five major skills, ranging from least important to most important.

For additional details on the data sources used and how the analysis was conducted, see the boxes within this post and the full methodology from a related Pew Research Center report released in January.

Immigrants more likely than U.S.-born workers to work in lower-skill jobs

Immigrants and U.S.-born workers differ when it comes to the skills their jobs prioritize. Immigrants are less likely to work in jobs placing a higher degree of importance on nonmechanical skills - specifically social, fundamental, analytical or managerial skills. (See the accompanying text box for the definitions of these skills.)

The U.S. Department of Labor's Occupational Information Network ( O*NET), a government database of occupational information, provides ratings on the importance of 35 detailed job skills. We grouped these skills into five major families of job skills as follows:

Social skills - instructing, service orientation, monitoring, social perceptiveness, coordination, negotiation and persuasion

Fundamental skills - critical thinking, writing, speaking, reading comprehension, active listening, active learning, learning strategies, and judgment and decision-making

Analytical skills - science, mathematics, programming, complex problem solving, systems analysis, systems evaluation, operations analysis and technology design

Managerial skills - management of personnel resources, management of financial resources, management of material resources and time management

Mechanical skills - troubleshooting, equipment selection, equipment maintenance, repairing, installation, operation monitoring, quality control analysis and operation and control

This analysis divides occupations into four skill tiers based on the importance rating of each of the five skill groups. Occupations are ranked by their importance rating on, say, social skills, and the top 25% of occupations (the highest quartile) are listed as "most important" users of social skills. The second and third quartile of occupations are defined to be "more important" and "less important" users of social skills, respectively. Finally, the bottom 25% of occupations (the lowest quartile) are listed as "least important" users of social skills. This process is repeated for each of the five major skill groups.

Examples of occupations with among the greatest need for these skill groups are as follows:

Social skills - Sales managers, coaches and scouts, marriage and family therapists

Fundamental skills - Lawyers, psychiatrists, education administrators

Analytical skills - Physicists, biomedical engineers, computer and information research scientists

Managerial skills - Chief executives, construction managers, medical and health services managers

Mechanical skills - Signal and track switch repairers, industrial machinery mechanics, millwrights

In 2018, fewer than a third of foreign-born workers (30%) were employed in occupations where social skills are "most important," such as registered nurses and social service managers, compared with 44% of U.S.-born workers. The same pattern emerges for occupations in which fundamental skills are most important, like elementary school teachers and lawyers. Just one-in-four foreign-born workers were employed in these occupations in 2018, compared with about a third of U.S.-born workers (34%).

On the other hand, immigrants were more likely than U.S.-born workers to be employed in lower-skill jobs. In 2018, 43% of immigrant workers worked in jobs in which analytical skills are "least important," compared with only 28% of U.S.-born workers. Similarly, 35% of immigrants were employed in jobs in which fundamental skills are least important, compared with 19% of U.S.-born workers. Examples of these jobs include welders and loading machine operators.

The roles of immigrant and U.S.-born workers are reversed with respect to mechanical skills. In 2018, immigrants were more likely than U.S.-born workers to be employed in occupations where mechanical skills are "most" or "more important" (40% vs. 29%). These include jobs such as industrial machinery mechanics and electricians, which call for skills such as repairing and installation. But jobs calling for high-order mechanical skills are not necessarily high-wage jobs. The average wage in these jobs is well below the average wage in jobs in which social, fundamental, analytical or managerial skills are most important, as noted in a recent Pew Research Center report.

The share of immigrant workers in higher-skill jobs is rising

Although immigrants overall are still more concentrated in lower-skill jobs than U.S.-born workers, they have experienced employment growth in many high-skill occupations since 1995. The share of foreign-born workers employed in occupations where fundamental skills are most important increased from 20% in 1995 to 25% in 2018. Over the same period, the share of foreign-born workers in jobs most in need of social skills increased from 26% to 30%, and the share in high-analytical-skill jobs (such as biomedical engineers) increased from 19% to 24%. These changes have come amid a rising demand for skilled workers in the U.S. labor market overall.

As more immigrant workers transitioned into high-skill occupations, there have been simultaneous decreases in the share of foreign-born workers employed in occupations where social or fundamental skills are least important, such as dishwashers and crossing guards. For example, the share of foreign-born workers employed in occupations where social skills are least important decreased from 36% in 1995 to 26% in 2018.

This move toward high-skill occupations is due in part to a rising level of education among immigrants overall. In 2018, 34% of immigrants ages 25 and older had a bachelor's degree or more education, up from 22% in 1995. One contributing factor was a surge in the arrival of highly educated Asian immigrants during the 2000s, driven by the expansion of the H-1B visa program since the 1990s.

Immigrant groups differ in their likelihood of working in high-skill jobs

In 2018, Asian and white immigrants were much more likely than Hispanic and black immigrants to work in nonmechanical, high-skill occupations. For example, 42% of Asian immigrants and 36% of white immigrants worked in jobs where analytical skills are most important, such as chemical engineers and computer programmers, compared with 23% of black immigrants and just 11% of Hispanic immigrants. There were similar differences in jobs in which fundamental and managerial skills are most important. White immigrants were more likely than those in other groups to work in jobs prioritizing social skills.

Black immigrants, while lagging behind their white and Asian counterparts in high-skill jobs, were still more likely to be employed in these occupations than Hispanics. About one-in-five or more black immigrants were employed in high-analytical and high-fundamental-skill occupations, about double the share of Hispanic immigrants in similar jobs. Sizable gaps also existed between the representation of black and Hispanic immigrants in jobs in which social and managerial are most important.

Hispanic immigrants are most likely to be employed in lower-skill nonmechanical occupations. In 2018, the majority of Hispanic immigrants worked in occupations where analytical (57%) and fundamental (51%) skills are least important, and four-in-ten or more worked in occupations in which social or managerial skills are least important. These shares were significantly higher than those among other immigrant groups. For example, about one-in-five or fewer black, white and Asian immigrants were employed in occupations where social skills were least important.

At the same time, Hispanic immigrants are more likely than other immigrant workers to be employed in occupations requiring greater proficiency in mechanical skills, like elevator installers and repairers. In 2018, more than half of foreign-born Hispanic workers (54%) were employed in occupations where mechanical skills are most or more important, compared with about three-in-ten or fewer among Asian, black or white immigrants.

Despite the skill differences between immigrants of different races and ethnicities, all four groups have moved toward high-skill occupations and away from low-skill occupations over the past two decades. For example, only three-in-ten Asian immigrants worked in occupations where analytical skills are most important in 1995. By 2018, this share increased to 42%. And nearly four-in-ten white immigrants (36%) were employed in these occupations in 2018, up from three-in-ten in 1995.

Among foreign-born Hispanic workers, the share employed in occupations where social skills are most important increased from 16% in 1995 to 21% in 2018. Hispanic immigrant workers also moved away from bottom-tier social-skill occupations, with their share in these jobs falling from 51% in 1995 to 40% in 2018.

Like Hispanic immigrant workers, the share of black immigrants in high-social skill occupations has also gone up. The share of black immigrant workers in these occupations stood at 34% in 2018, up from 26% in 1995.

The rising share of immigrants in high-skill occupations is partly explained by higher levels of education among all four immigrant groups. In 2018, 55% of white immigrants and 61% of Asian immigrants had a bachelor's degree or more education, considerably greater than in 1995, when these shares stood at 38% and 45%, respectively. The share of black immigrants with a bachelor's degree or more increased from 25% in 1995 to 36% in 2018, due in part to highly educated black immigrants moving to the U.S. from Africa.

Among Hispanics, the share of immigrants with a bachelor's degree or more increased from 8% in 1995 to 15% in 2018. More recently, a decrease in the number of unauthorized workers since 2008 has likely contributed to a shift toward higher-skill occupations among Hispanics. A slowdown in arrivals from Latin America, especially from Mexico, also boosted the number of years the typical Hispanic immigrant has lived in the United States. In 2018, half of Latin American immigrant workers had been living in the U.S. for at least 20 years, compared with 36% in 2008. Research has shown that more time spent in the U.S. generally leads to better opportunities in the labor market.

This analysis is based on the combination of job skills and preparation data from the U.S. Department of Labor's Occupational Information Network ( O*NET) and occupational employment data from the Current Population Survey (CPS).

The O*NET database provides a variety of information related to the requirements of more than 950 occupations. The occupations are classified according to a coding scheme that is consistent with the 2010 Standard Occupational Classification. Among other things, O*NET includes information on 35 specific skills representing attributes of workers related to work performance (critical thinking or service orientation, for example). Each skill is rated on a scale of one to five measuring its importance to job performance, from not important to extremely important. This analysis uses Version 23, released in 2018.

Conducted jointly by the U.S. Census Bureau and the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the CPS is a monthly survey of approximately 55,000 households and is the source of the nation's official statistics on unemployment. The CPS sample covers the civilian, non-institutionalized population. In this analysis, 12 monthly CPS files in each year were combined to generate annual estimates of occupational employment in 1995 and 2018. The CPS microdata files used in this report are the Integrated Public Use Microdata Series ( IPUMS-CPS) provided by the University of Minnesota.

Because O*NET does not contain employment information for occupations, it is necessary to match the skills data to CPS data. Although both the 2018 O*NET and the CPS use the 2010 standard occupational classification there is one key difference: O*NET lists more than 950 occupations coded at the eight-digit level, the finest detail possible, whereas the CPS lists fewer than 500 occupations coded at the four-digit level. In other words, an occupation listed in the CPS typically encompasses more than one occupation listed in O*NET. Thus, occupational data in O*NET must be aggregated to match up to the CPS data. See here for more details on the aggregation methods and matching the two datasets.

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The share of immigrant workers in high-skill jobs is rising in the U.S.

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The shift has been most notable in jobs that prioritize analytical skills, such as science and math, or fundamental skills, such as writing.

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The dark history of the Chinese Exclusion Act

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The dark history of the Chinese Exclusion Act

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The dark history of the Chinese Exclusion Act - Robert Chang

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Contributions of Immigrants Are Essential to US Economic Growth and Competitiveness

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Contributions of Immigrants Are Essential to US Economic Growth and Competitiveness

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The Contributions of Immigrants Are Essential to US Economic Growth and Competitiveness

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There is a lot of data available about refugees and migrants. Here are some infographics based on official data sources that you can download and share.