There are about 47 million people in the U.S. born in another country. Let’s look at where in Asia they come from. The chart below shows the largest sources: China, India, Philippines, Vietnam and Korea. (other sources with slightly less immigrants than Korea are Japan and Pakistan. Together they account for about 20% of foreign born in the U.S. today. Contrast this with 1960, where there were hardly any Asian immigrants due to the racist barrier of the 1924 immigration act, overturned in the 1965 immigration act.

The U.S. is for Chinese by far the biggest destination (2.4 million), the next being Canada (700K). For India, Saudi Arabia and the Gulf States have upwards of 10 million Indians but these are almost all guest workers, whereas Indians in the U.S. are here to stay. The next largest permanent destinations for Indians are the U.K (800K) and Canada (600K). For the Philippines, the next largest destination is Canada (500K). for Vietnam, it’s Australia (200K). For Korea, it is China (200K) followed by Canada and Australia.

Note that these figures are for persons born outside the U.S. and do not include second and later generations,

For data, go here.