[colombiamigra] Fw: A Language and Education Profile of Immigrants in the United States – MPI Data Hub – February 27, 2013

From: william mejia <wmejia8a@xxxxxxxxx>
To: "colombiamigra@xxxxxxxxxxxxx" <colombiamigra@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Date: Wed, 27 Feb 2013 13:42:16 -0800 (PST)


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From: "Jeanne Batalova, MPI Data Hub" <data@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
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Subject: A Language and Education Profile of Immigrants in the United States – 
MPI Data Hub – February 27, 2013 
 

 
 
A Language and Education Profile of Immigrants in the United States  

Plus, Barriers to Naturalization in the United States and International 
Migrants in South Korea 

 Because immigrants bring along their cultures and languages when they settle 
in their new destinations, you may hear, for instance, Polish and Russian in 
Illinois, Somali and Swahili in Minnesota, Spanish and Haitian Creole in New 
York, Korean and Armenian in California, or Arabic and German in Michigan. 

This month, we have updated our US Foreign Born Data Tool with key national and 
state-level statistics on immigrants' linguistic diversity, English language 
skills, and educational attainment (using statistics from the 2011 American 
Community Survey). Visit the "Language and Education" fact sheets for a 
state-by-state (or national) look at characteristics of the foreign born, which 
include statistics on languages spoken by immigrants, their levels of 
education, rates of English proficiency, and a comparison to native residents. 
Here are some topline findings: 

*¿Habla Español? Spanish is the most common language spoken by people who speak 
a language other than English at home.  Nationwide, of the 60.6 million people 
who speak a language other than English, 62 percent speak Spanish. Spanish was 
also the top spoken language other than English in 45 states and the District 
of Columbia. Only in five states did another language predominate (see Table 5, 
Language Other Than English Spoken At Home): 

Alaska, where 30 percent spoke native North American languages, followed by 
Spanish (21 percent) and Tagalog (13 percent); Hawaii,  where 35 percent spoke 
various Pacific Island languages, followed by Tagalog (17 percent) and Japanese 
(14 percent); Maine,  where 54 percent spoke French, followed by Spanish (15 
percent) and German (4 percent); North Dakota,  where 27 percent spoke German, 
followed by Spanish (23 percent) and native North American languages, including 
Navajo (6 percent);    and Vermont,   where 32 percent spoke French, followed 
by Spanish (21 percent) and German (6 percent). 

* Immigrants are concentrated at the high and low ends of the education 
continuum:  Nationally, 27 percent of immigrant adults had a bachelor's degree 
or higher (compared to 29 percent of the US born). In contrast, the share of 
immigrant adults with less than a high school diploma was 32 percent (compared 
to 11 percent for the US born).    Naturalized US citizens were much more 
likely to have a college degree than noncitizens (33 percent versus 22 
percent). 

* High demand continues for English language instruction:  
In 2011, 20.5 million immigrants were Limited English Proficient (LEP) — 
defined as persons age 5 and older who reported speaking English "not at all,"  
"not well," or "well" — and accounting for 51 percent of all immigrants over 
age 5. The highest LEP shares among immigrants were found in both traditional 
and new immigrant-destination states: Texas (60 percent), Nebraska (59 
percent), California (58 percent),   and New Mexico (58 percent). 

Check out our LEP data brief on the number, share, growth, and linguistic 
diversity of the LEP population at the national, state, and metropolitan area 
levels here. 

To learn more about language and educational characteristics of the immigrant 
and native-born populations, visit the Data Hub's 2011 ACS/Census tool online 
and select the state you are interested in (or click on the small map of the 
United States for national data). Fact sheets covering immigrants' workforce 
and income characteristics will be updated in the coming months. 

Graph of the Month 
Naturalization — the process of an immigrant becoming a citizen — is an 
important milestone on the path to full social and economic integration and 
membership in the host country. In the United States,  naturalized citizens can 
vote and run for public office (except for President and Vice President), 
receive protection from deportation, have full access to public benefits, are 
eligible to sponsor relatives from abroad, and can obtain a US passport, which 
makes it easier to travel to many countries around the world. In 2011, the 
number of naturalized US citizens stood at 18.1 million (or 45 percent of all 
immigrants). An additional 8.5 million were eligible to become US citizens. 
However, not all immigrants who are eligible choose to or can take the next 
step toward full membership. (For more about the economic and social benefits 
of citizenship and barriers to naturalization, read here).

A recent report by Pew Hispanic Center found, for instance, that Mexican 
immigrants had a low rate of naturalization (only 36 percent of those eligible 
became naturalized). In contrast, 68 percent for all non-Mexican immigrants and 
61 percent of Latin American immigrants (excluding Mexico) naturalized when 
they become eligible. 

A nationwide survey of Hispanic immigrants found that barriers such as a lack 
of English proficiency and difficulty of the US citizenship test made 
naturalization difficult for about 26 percent of survey respondents. An 
additional 18 percent reported that the $680 naturalization fee put the goal 
out of reach. 

Reasons for Not Naturalizing 
(Share among survey Hispanic respondents who were permanent residents) 

  

Source: Pew Hispanic Center, The Path Not Taken: Two-thirds of Legal Mexican 
Immigrants are not U.S. Citizens,  2012. Available here. 

DATA HUB QUIZ 
South Korean musician PSY is arguably one of the most famous Koreans today — 
catapulted to fame by the catchy Gangnam Style tune that spawned die-hard fans 
and die-from-laughter parodies around the world. But PSY can't claim that he 
was the first to open the doors of South Korea to others; as the last two 
decades testify, thousands of people not only visited but also stayed to live, 
study, and work in Korea. Whereas in 1990 the number of international migrants 
(i.e., non-Korean citizens) was barely 50,000, by 2012 it had grown by leaps 
and bounds. Can you guess the number of migrants in Korea today: Is it 500,000, 
1 million, or close to 1.5 million? Check your answer here. 

HAVE YOU READ... 

 Ripe with Change: Evolving Farm Labor Markets in the United States, Mexico, 
and Central America 
By Philip Martin and J. Edward Taylor 

Mexico is in the transitional phase of being both farm labor exporter and 
importer: serving as the major supplier of hired labor to US farms but 
increasingly also relying on farm workers from Guatemala. This report examines 
the labor market dynamics of the region, focusing on changes in the volume and 
composition of production, the supermarket revolution in Latin America, 
training and education changes, and more. It assesses the implications of these 
changes on workers and migration. 


On behalf of the MPI Data Hub team, thank you for your interest in and support 
of the Data Hub.

 
Data Manager and Senior Policy Analyst 
Migration Policy Institute 
data@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx 

________________________________
 The MPI Data Hub is a project of the Migration Policy Institute (MPI). Find 
out more about MPI at http://www.migrationpolicy.org/. 

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[colombiamigra] Fw: A Language and Education Profile of Immigrants in the United States – MPI Data Hub – February 27, 2013

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