In one 2022 study, researchers analyzed data on more than a million firms that were founded between 2005 and 2010 and that survived for at least five years. They found that 0.83 percent of the immigrants in the US workforce launched a business during this period, compared with 0.46 percent of the native-born.  The databases examined include ones that tend to feature either large or small businesses. The pattern of higher entrepreneurship is apparent among all sizes of firms.

STEM related enterprises (involving computer and mathematical scientists, engineers, and life scientists): Some 18% of all workers are foreign-born. But the foreign born make up 23% of the STEM workforce with a bachelor’s degree or higher. Foreign-born workers make up 45% or more of all STEM workers with doctorates. level who work as. Thus it is not surprising that among firms started between 2005 and 2010, those with an immigrant founder were 35 percent more likely to have obtained a patent than those with only native-born founders.

In a 2023 study, researchers compared localities in the U.S. in terms of activity per capita in starting a firm.   They found a very wide variation in start ups among localities. Two factors were closely associated with higher than average start-up activity: the rate of college graduates and the rate of foreign-born persons.