Working Immigrants

A 2002 Census publication tracks the growth of the slave population in the South, 1790 – 1860. The chart shows the growth of the slave population in the South. Importation of slaves was banned in 1808. The slave population grew from 1790 to 1860 – 70 years — by an average compound rate of 2.4% a year. Contrast that with the average compound rate of growth of the U.S. population between 1945 and 2000 – 1.3%.

In 1860, 66% of the North’s Black population was free; only 6% of the Black population in the South was free. The South accounted for 91% of the Black population in the U.S. in 1790, and 92% in 1860.




Now look at the northern migration of Blacks, which took off in the early 20th Century. These charts show the percentage of population that was Black. The decline in the percentage of blacks in the Mississippi population reflects southern out- migration. The rise in the percentage of Blacks in Illinois reflects northern in-migration. In 1900, the South accounted for 89% of the Black population; in 1990, only 52%.

there are 60 million plus Hispanics in the U.S. Their population growth rate is now a subdued 1.9% a year compared to negative for Whites. In 2000 there were 36 million Hispanics. The median age of Hispanics has increased and, among foreign-born the tenure in the U.S. has significantly increased.

Ten million of the 60 million reside in four mega Hispanic cities– the counties with at least 1.25 million Hispanics: Los Angeles county (4.9 million, the most populous county in California), Harris County (2.1 million,Houston, the most populous county in Texas), Miami-Dade (1.9 million, the most populous county in Florida), and Maricopa County (1.4 milion, Phoenix, the most populous county in Arizona). Five of the counties with the largest Hispanic population are in California.

Go here.

From the U.S. Census Bureau: “In 2000, the racial/ethnic makeup of US residents was: White, 69 percent; Hispanic and Black, 13 percent each ; and Asian and other, six percent. By 2050, these per centages are projected to be: 50, 24,15, and 13.” 

In 1977, The Census Bureau introduced the ethnic category of Hispanic.In the 2000 census four in ten of those who identified as Hispanic or Latino on the ethnicity question rejected all the racial categories or referred to “some other race.” This meant that 6% of the population placed themselves in ethnic or racial limbo.

2010 12% of young people called themselves multiracial. By 2050, 10% of whites and blacks and more than 50% of Latinos, Asians and native American Indians will be married to someone outside the racial group. This suggests that in 2020 25% of households will call itself multiracial.

See Nell Irvin Painter. The History of White People, pages 384-385 and Jennifer L. Hochschild. Racial Trends in the United States, Daedalus, Winter, 2005.

There are about 10.5 million unauthorized persons in the U.S, making up 23% of all foreign born persons.  Though their share of all unauthorized immigrants is shrinking, given economic and demographic changes in Mexico and strengthened U.S. border enforcement, Mexicans still accounted for 51% of all unauthorized immigrants. Mexico and Central America represented 68 percent of the total, with Asia at 14%, South America at 7% and Europe/Canada/Oceania combined at 6%.

Fifteen percent, or 1.7 million people, held a temporary status or deferral of deportation with work authorization, including DACA beneficiaries (about 900,000), Temporary Protected Status (TPS) holders and asylum applicants granted employment authorization.

About 1.6 million unauthorized immigrants were married to U.S. citizens and another 675,000 were married to lawful permanent residents (LPRs). At the same time, 4.4 million U.S.-citizen children, or 6% of all children under 18 had at least one unauthorized immigrant parent.

Go here and here.

The total number of international students studying at U.S. universities, whether from within the U.S. or online from abroad, decreased by 16 percent this fall, while enrollments of new international students decreased by 43 percent, according to a new survey of more than 700 colleges conducted by 10 major higher education organizations.

The survey provides a first look at how hard international enrollments have been hit by the COVID-19 pandemic. The survey found that one in five international students are studying online from outside the U.S. Ninety percent of responding institutions reported student deferrals, collectively reporting that nearly 40,000 international students have deferred their studies to a future term.

Pre-pandemic data show a 0.6 percent decline in new international enrollments in 2019-20 — the fourth straight year of declines in new international enrollments — and a 1.8 percent decrease in the total number of international students. The decline in total international student numbers is the first recorded year-over-year decline in total international student numbers since 2005-06.

From here.

European immigration provided the large semi or unskilled workforces for industrial growth in the first decades of the 20th Century. They cut off access to these jobd by Blacks who otherwise would have migrated in large numbers from the South.

Here is the abstract of a 2009 article:

In this study, we measure the contribution of immigrants and their descendents to the growth and industrial transformation of the American workforce in the age of mass immigration from 1880 to 1920. The size and selectivity of the immigrant community, as well as their disproportionate residence in large cities, meant they were the mainstay of the American industrial workforce. Immigrants and their children comprised over half of manufacturing workers in 1920, and if the third generation (the grandchildren of immigrants) are included, then more than two-thirds of workers in the manufacturing sector were of recent immigrant stock. Although higher wages and better working conditions might have encouraged more long-resident native-born workers to the industrial economy, the scale and pace of the American industrial revolution might well have slowed. The closing of the door to mass immigration in the 1920s did lead to increased recruitment of native-born workers, particularly from the South, to northern industrial cities in the middle decades of the 20th century.

Immigration and the American Industrial Revolution From 1880 to 1920, by Charles Hirschman and Elizabeth Mogford. Soc Sci Res. 2009 Dec 1; 38(4): 897–920.