The United States of America continues to be a land of immigrants, but there is a significant decline in the number of new migrants. According to the American Community Survey (ACS) data for 2018, which measures the US population as of July 1, 2018, the total number of foreign-born population in the US stood at 44.7 million or 13.7% of the total US population of 327 million.
The rise in the number of foreign-born over the previous year is insignificant with a mere 0.4% increase. However, compared with 2010, where the total number of foreign-born population stood at 40 million, it signifies an increase of 11.8%. The Center for Immigration Studies (CIS), a US based think-tank, which is considered to be protectionist in its views, has in its research report, provided data based on country of birth. As of July 1, 2018, the population originating from India stood at 2.65 million, a miniscule increase of 1.5% over the previous year’s figure of 2.61million.
Indians comprise less than 1% of US population
Indians constituted 5.9% of the total foreign-born population as of July 2018, but comprise less than 1% of the total US population. Between 2010 and 2018, the number of those from India rose by 870,000, signifying an increase of 49%. Back in 1990, there were just 450,000 individuals having their place of birth in India. The number increased by 489% from this date till 2018. The foreign-born population from China increased from 2.16 million in 2010 to 2.84 million in 2018 (up by 678,000) signifying an increase of nearly 32%.
According to the US Census Board, the term foreign-born refers to individuals who were not US citizens at birth. It includes those immigrants who later obtained US citizenship, green card holders, temporary workers (such as those on H-1B visa) and international students. It does not include those who are on a short stay such as tourists and business travellers.
CIS in its research paper states that 1.45 million new legal and illegal immigrants settled in US in 2017, fewer than the 1.75 million in 2016 or 1.62 million in 2015. “The falloff in arrivals in 2017, may be due to increased enforcement efforts, lower refugee admissions and more robust vetting of applications undertaken by the Trump administration,” it states in its research report. It points out that full data is available of immigrants in 2017, but as the population is captured as of July 1, only data of the first six months is available for 2018.
