I came across this report a while back, and decided it might be good to share:
Immigrants in the United States, 2007: A profile of America's Foreign-Born Population | Center for Immigration Studies
It's from the Center for Immigration Studies, and is called: Immigrants in the United States, 2007: A profile of America's Foreign-Born Population
It offers an objective, statistical and methodologically sound insight into legal and illegal foreign-born people in the U.S., and specifically there are some very interesting findings about Dominican immigrants.
Here are some of the Dominican-related highlights that I have pulled from it:
-The DR as a country ranks 10th in the quantity (not percentage of population) of immigrants living in the U.S.
-Of the "top 25" countries that are covered in the report, the DR ranks last for the percent of immigrants that are "self-employed" (5.1%)
-The Dominican immigrants are the group that is most likely to live in poverty (27.9%), and when considering Dominican immigrants with children it's even higher (31.2%)
-27.9% of Dominican immigrants live in poverty vs 17.8% for Haitian
-Dominican immigrants are more likely to have their own health insurance coverage than other Hispanic immigrants and all immigrants in general
-Dominican immigrants have the highest usage of any group in the "top 25" of usage of "means-tested programs" (aka welfare), with 63% getting some type of public assistance (38.8% of Haitians use it)
-38% of Dominican immigrants have below a high school education, while 10% have a college degree or higher (for Haitians it's 17.6% / 23.8%)
One of the conclusions from the report:
"The current immigration system allows most legal immigrants into the country through family re-unification channels primarily based on whether they have a relative here. This fact, coupled with widespread tolerance of illegal immigration, means the foreign-born population as a whole is much less educated than the native-born population. Given the nature of the modern American economy and the existence of a well-developed welfare state, it seems unavoidable that less-educated immigrants will tend to have lower incomes, make heavier use of means-tested programs, and be more likely to lack health insurance than natives."
So, perhaps common sense would say that lower education = more likely to be poor = more likely to use welfare.
But that's not true for the Dominicans. They don't fare the worst for education, and then they lead some of the countries whose immigrants are "less educated" than they are by some 20% in use of of public means-tested programs (welfare).
What do you think about the report? Can you get anything else out of it?
What cultural, social or policy-level factors, either in the DR or the US, could contribute to the Dominicans being the poorest and highest users of welfare?
Please support your posts with data from this report, other research, the census, etc. and NOT your own, a friend's or family member's personal experiences or observations. There are always exceptions, good and bad, but I am hoping for a more objective and evidence-based analysis of Dominican immigrants in the U.S.
P.S.-I mentioned some Haiti stats to show that the poorer the country the immigrant comes from does not mean the poorer the immigrant in the U.S. There must be some cultural, social or policy influences at work.
Immigrants in the United States, 2007: A profile of America's Foreign-Born Population | Center for Immigration Studies
It's from the Center for Immigration Studies, and is called: Immigrants in the United States, 2007: A profile of America's Foreign-Born Population
It offers an objective, statistical and methodologically sound insight into legal and illegal foreign-born people in the U.S., and specifically there are some very interesting findings about Dominican immigrants.
Here are some of the Dominican-related highlights that I have pulled from it:
-The DR as a country ranks 10th in the quantity (not percentage of population) of immigrants living in the U.S.
-Of the "top 25" countries that are covered in the report, the DR ranks last for the percent of immigrants that are "self-employed" (5.1%)
-The Dominican immigrants are the group that is most likely to live in poverty (27.9%), and when considering Dominican immigrants with children it's even higher (31.2%)
-27.9% of Dominican immigrants live in poverty vs 17.8% for Haitian
-Dominican immigrants are more likely to have their own health insurance coverage than other Hispanic immigrants and all immigrants in general
-Dominican immigrants have the highest usage of any group in the "top 25" of usage of "means-tested programs" (aka welfare), with 63% getting some type of public assistance (38.8% of Haitians use it)
-38% of Dominican immigrants have below a high school education, while 10% have a college degree or higher (for Haitians it's 17.6% / 23.8%)
One of the conclusions from the report:
"The current immigration system allows most legal immigrants into the country through family re-unification channels primarily based on whether they have a relative here. This fact, coupled with widespread tolerance of illegal immigration, means the foreign-born population as a whole is much less educated than the native-born population. Given the nature of the modern American economy and the existence of a well-developed welfare state, it seems unavoidable that less-educated immigrants will tend to have lower incomes, make heavier use of means-tested programs, and be more likely to lack health insurance than natives."
So, perhaps common sense would say that lower education = more likely to be poor = more likely to use welfare.
But that's not true for the Dominicans. They don't fare the worst for education, and then they lead some of the countries whose immigrants are "less educated" than they are by some 20% in use of of public means-tested programs (welfare).
What do you think about the report? Can you get anything else out of it?
What cultural, social or policy-level factors, either in the DR or the US, could contribute to the Dominicans being the poorest and highest users of welfare?
Please support your posts with data from this report, other research, the census, etc. and NOT your own, a friend's or family member's personal experiences or observations. There are always exceptions, good and bad, but I am hoping for a more objective and evidence-based analysis of Dominican immigrants in the U.S.
P.S.-I mentioned some Haiti stats to show that the poorer the country the immigrant comes from does not mean the poorer the immigrant in the U.S. There must be some cultural, social or policy influences at work.