Coverage of Foreign-Born Professionals in the United States:

WASHINGTON (AP) -- Immigrant professionals are getting higher-paying jobs than native-born Americans in hospitals, universities and other institutions, as Asians outdistance whites in many professions, according to a new study.

The census-based study found more foreign-born Indian doctors than native-born black doctors, with striking disparity in median salaries among racial groups. And it found significantly larger proportions of Asian and white professionals than either blacks or Hispanics.

It suggested a professional hierarchy of jobs and salaries is emerging in U.S. institutions with Asians pushing towards the top, whites in the middle and blacks and Hispanics at the bottom.

The report by the independent Center for Immigration Studies credited foreign-born professionals with providing a ''double gift'' to the United States by enriching scientific research and education and by providing services for people who would not otherwise get them.

It also noted that the children of foreign-born professionals tend to perform well academically and to become professionals themselves.

''The United States may be neglecting the interests of the native born, particularly minorities, in its increased reliance on foreign scientific and technical talent,'' the report said.

The report, based on 1990 U.S. Census data, found that the median annual salary of foreign-born professionals is dlrs 35,363, compared to dlrs 31,008 for those born in the United States. The study covered a wide variety of professions in physical and social sciences, health services, teaching, legal fields and artistic endeavors.

Among professionals, foreigners earn about dlrs 4,000 more a year than people of the same race born in the United States. Native-born blacks have the lowest median salary of any group, just over dlrs 26,000.

Some of the widest disparities are due to the fact that immigrants from some countries tend to chose higher-paying professions than others. But there also was a pattern of differences in salaries by race within professions, with foreign-born earning more than native-born.

An exception was Mexicans immigrant professionals earned less than native-born ones.

The highest paid of any foreign-born group analyzed separately is Korean doctors, who have a median income of dlrs 101,000, the report said. Indian physicians ranked second at dlrs 82,205. It said 14,000 foreign-born Asian professionals earn more than dlrs 150,000 a year from their professions.

The study, by demographers Leon F. Bouvier and David Simcox, said universities may eventually have to work to recruit, motivate and train more native-born Americans.

''Additionally, large-scale American siphoning of the best and brightest professionals from developing countries can distrupt the efforts of those nations to train and retain professionals needed for their own development,'' the report said.

It noted that the United States now has 51,600 professionals who left their homelands in Africa and 39,000 from Central America.

The Philippines alone has sent 47,000 registered nurses, it said, noting that they earn an average of dlrs 5,000 more a year than other registered nurses and are the highest-paid of any group of nurses.

''Asian professionals are now outdistancing, numerically, their white counterparts in engineering, math and computer science, natural scienes, college teaching and medicine and the health professions,'' the report said.

''Demographic change and current migration patterns are likely to produce an even greater Asian presence in these high-income professions, and a corresponding decline in the number, attainment and incomes of white professionals.''

Frank Morris, president of the Council of Historically Black Graduate Schools, blamed testing methods that discriminate against minorities and graduate school admissions practices that favor foreigners for much of the disparity.

''University departments will use low test scores on quanitative abilities to disqualify African-American applicants from science programs,'' Morris said, ''but will accept foreign students in spite of low test scores in English and work with them to overcome their language disability.''

The Center for Immigration Studies is a non-profit research group which conducts research and policy analysis on immigration issues, supported by foundation grants and individual donations.

WASHINGTON -- FOREIGN-BORN professionals are quickly expanding their role in the American economy, particularly in the fields of engineering, medicine, and scientific research.

Highly educated workers from India, China, South Korea, and several other nations have arrived in the United States in growing numbers. There are now more Indian-born physicians in the US, for example, than native-born black doctors.

Brilliant European inventors and scholars, such as Edward Teller from Hungary and the late Albert Einstein from Germany, have long held an important place in US science and engineering. Today, America is attracting top talent from every corner of the globe.

Leon Bouvier, a demographer at the Tulane University School of Public Health, says many of the foreign-born professionals are better trained than their American counterparts - and often earn more as a result.

On average, Asians had the highest average levels of schooling and income among foreign-born professionals.

Dr. Bouvier and David Simcox, a senior fellow at the Center for Immigration Studies, used 1990 census data to measure the performance of foreign-born professionals in the US. They found that professionals from abroad earned more than their native-born counterparts in engineering, computer science, math, college teaching, nursing, and medicine.

Physicians born in South Korea earned a median income of $ 101,289, well above the $ 81,147 of native-born Americans. Indian-born doctors, at $ 83,305, and Chinese-born physicians, at $ 82,020, also outpaced those born in the US.

American-born professionals dominated other fields, however, including the law and elementary and secondary teaching. Foreign-born professionals often show a preference for more scientific pursuits.

Bouvier suggests that with cutbacks in US defense spending and tightening budgets for research, America may want to reassess its policy of attracting large numbers of foreign-born professionals. Flooding the US job market with competitors from abroad ''clearly has major consequences'' for US professionals, he says.

The Bouvier-Simcox study notes a sharp difference between race and ethnicity in the domestic and foreign-born population of professionals.

Among native-born professionals, 89 percent are white, 8 percent are black, 3 percent are Hispanic, and 1 percent are of Asian descent. Among foreign-born professionals, only 41 percent are white, 35 percent are from Asia, 17 percent are Hispanic, and 7 percent are black.

Well-educated Asian immigrants have rapidly established themselves at the top of the scientific and medical professions in the United States, outdistancing native-born blacks and Hispanics both in achievement and earnings, according to a report issued by the Center for Immigration Studies.

The influx of Asian professionals has filled the needs of American businesses and universities, and it was facilitated by U.S. immigration policies. But the report argues that the ready availability of skilled foreigners has meant that fewer native-born Americans, especially minorities, have moved into areas such as engineering, medicine and computer science.

If the trend continues, the report suggests that the professional labor force could develop "a three-tier racial distribution topped by Asian professionals, with non-Hispanic whites as a middle tier, and blacks and Hispanics in the lower tier."

The Center for Immigration Studies is a Washington-based research institute that has published several reports and books portraying contemporary immigration as an event with negative demographic and environmental consequences.

Immigration's impact on the nation's disadvantaged minorities has become a subject of growing interest among policymakers and experts in recent years. Most of the attention, however, has focused on the influx of large numbers of Latino immigrants into minimum-wage and blue-collar jobs. Through an analysis of census data, this report examines some of immigration's effects on the most demanding and highly paid professions.

For example, the report found that there are more foreign-born Indian physicians than there are native-born black physicians, more Filipino nurses than native-born Hispanic nurses, and nearly twice as many foreign-born Vietnamese engineers as native-born Puerto Rican engineers.

Asian immigrants not only have surpassed native minorities in sheer numbers in many professions but also in remuneration, the report stated. While nearly 12,000 Asian-born physicians earned more than $ 150,000 a year, fewer than 1,900 blacks, native- and foreign-born, were paid that much. Although there are slightly more black college professors than Asian immigrant professors, nearly three times as many Asian professors earn more than $ 75,000 a year than blacks.

One obvious cause of these disparities is that foreign-born professionals in general are better educated than their native-born colleagues, and this is especially true among Asians. For example, the study reports that two-thirds of all Indian professionals in the United States have advanced degrees and nearly 91 percent have college diplomas, which is more than twice the rate for native-born non-Hispanic whites.

The success of immigrants in science and medicine also reflects a movement away from those fields by the native born, the report states. Since 1975, the number of Americans seeking doctorates in science and engineering has been flat, and native-born professionals are now concentrated in pre-college education, the social sciences and legal professions.

Moreover, the report notes that in recent years Congress has created new immigrant categories to accommodate the highly skilled and has taken other measures designed to encourage an influx of registered nurses, to give permanent status to Chinese scholars here during events surrounding the 1989 Tiananmen Square massacre and to facilitate immigration by scientists from the former Soviet Union.

The report was written by Leon F. Bouvier, a professor of demography at Tulane University, and David Simcox, a consultant on immigration matters.

"Foreign-born professionals have been a double gift to the United States," the report said. "They have helped meet the needs of underserved populations and enriched scientific research and education. Moreover, they tend to have native-born children who perform well academically and in many cases will themselves become professionals."

On the negative side, the report states that "continued access to large numbers of foreign-born professionals offers few incentives for labor markets to make the necessary adjustments to attract, train and retain an adequate domestic work force," and it suggests that this lack of incentive has slowed the movement of native-born minorities into the scientific and medical professions.

WASHINGTON, DC -- While recognizing the overall benefits of immigration to the U.S., a recent study has concluded that the increasing presence of foreign-born professionals in scientific and medical professions is proving to be a problem for American-born workers, particularly minorities.

Foreign Born Professionals In the United States, the study by the Washington, D.C.-based Center for Immigration Studies, concludes that: "The increasing number of foreign professionals may be discouraging labor market adjustments that would attract the native born to higher paying professions."

At the same time, the study notes "a striking underrepresentation of blacks and Hispanics, both foreign and native born" in those same professions.

The study is based on 1990 census data that analyzed America's labor force population by race according to the total number of foreign-born and native-born U.S. residents in each racial grouping and by the year of arrival for foreign-born residents.

Besides pointing out the impact that the influx of foreign-born professionals has on native-born Americans, the study also notes the effect on the sending countries. "Large-scale American siphoning of the best and brightest professionals from developing countries can disrupt the efforts of those nations to train and retain professionals needed for their own development. There are now in the United States 51,600 professionals from African nations, 39,000 professionals from Central America, and 47,000 registered nurses from the Philippines. Can these nations afford to lose their most highly-skilled workers to the United States?" asks the report.

The subject of Asian-born workers in the American labor force crops up again and again throughout its 55 pages. "The Asian foreign born seem to do as well, if not better, than whites, whether native or foreign born. Black and Hispanics are more likely to be employed in the blue collar, lowerpaying, jobs than whites and Asians, irrespective of nativity."

The report notes that in the United States today:

- There are more foreign-born Indian physicians than there are native-born black physicians.

- There are more foreign-born Filipino nurses than native-born Hispanic nurses.

- There are twice as many foreign-born Vietnamese as native-born Puerto Rican engineers.

According to The Washington Post, the Center for Immigration Studies is a Washington-based research institute that has published several reports and books portraying contemporary immigration as having negative demographic and enviromental consequences.

Yvonne Lee of the Coalition of Asian Pacific Americans said that the study "does not differentiate between foreign-trained Asians and American-trained Asians. Many of the foreign-born Asians are trained in the U.S. because of the immigration pattern since 1965. So you're looking at foreign-born Asians who are citizens trained in the U.S."

Lee, who noted that according to "1990 census data, 41 percent of foreign-born Asians are U.S. citizens," added that the U.S. government has not put emphasis on the need for trained professionals in the science and math fields for the last two decades.

Bill Ong Hing, a Standford University law professor and immigration lawyer, called the report "simplistic for concluding that natives don't go into professions because of immigrants."

Hing said, "I've taken the position for a long time that if we're going to cut back on any immigrants to the U.S., which I'm not ready to concede, it should be the professional category because I believe we should be devoting more resources and training to other minority groups to get more professionals from (American) minority communities."

Hing, who objected to the expansion in 1990 of the U.S. immigration allowance for skilled professionals, suggested that employers who use the skilled immigrant category to fill their labor needs should be "forced to pay into a fund for training of (American) minorities in these professions."

Louisa Parker of the Federation for American Immigration Reform (FAIR) in Washington, D.C., disagreed with those views. She endorses the report's conclusions. "We were not surprised by the findings of the center. For years, FAIR has recognized the impact that high levels of immigration has had on Americans on all rungs of the labor force ladder. Americans have a right to be concerned about the labor market being flooded with foreign professionals and the loss of job opportunities for Americans, especially minorities. With few jobs to be found in any profession, it makes no sense for this country to bring in such high numbers of professionals when there are American professionals who want to work. It's a slap in the face to American professionals."

"We should train our own people before we pull in someone who is cheaper from another country," said Parker. "Immigration policy should be tied to labor force needs that are in America's national interest. The answer is to set up policies like Stanford University once had, which gives more money to academic departments that hire American-born minority professors."

WASHINGTON: Foreign-born Indians comprised the highest-paid group with a median income of $40,625 while 67.9 percent of the total foreign-born professionals of Indian origin (113,744) in 1990 held an advanced degree.

"An astounding two-thirds of all Indian professionals have an advanced degree. Almost 91 percent have at least four years of college and most (59.6 percent) have advanced degrees," reports the Washington-based Center for Immigration Studies in revealing statistical findings evolved by Leon F. Bouvier and David Simcox.

Foreign-born Indians and Chinese are "the best educated engineers in the United States" and "no others have even half of their engineers comparably educated," the report observes.

The picture, CIS says, is similar among the native-born. Again those of Chinese and Indian descent dominate the share having advanced degrees. Over 28 percent of Chinese-Americans and 42 percent of Indian-Americans hold such degrees.

CONCENTRATION IN 3 AREAS

The CIS data indicates that Indian professionals (foreign-born) are concentrated in categories of physicians (19.6 percent), engineers (26 percent) and post-secondary teachers (12.2 percent).

Figures for these three respective categories for Chinese foreign-born professionals are 6.7 percent, 26.5 percent, and 15.8 percent while for the Japanese they are 5.6 percent, 21.6 percent and 11.2 percent.

While Chinese foreign-born account for 129,851 professionals (19 percent) of its total labor force of 682,760; Indian foreign-born professionals number 113,744 which is 29.9 percent of the total Indian labor force (foreign-born) of 379,970. Again at 30 percent, Indian professionals as a proportion of the total labor force in the United States in 1990 were the highest.

In that year, foreign-born professionals represented 8.2 percent of 16.5 million professionals in America.

The report notes that of a 50,585 total, 11,757 foreign-born Asians earned over $150,000. "Indeed, more Indian foreign-born physicians earned over $100,000 (4,856) than did all blacks." The total number of Indian physicians was 20,166.

TWO-TIER SOCIETY

According to CIS findings, there is growing concern about the "possible emergence of a two-tier society with Asians and whites at the top and blacks and Hispanics at the bottom."

On "ascendancy" of Asian professionals, the report concludes that Asian and white immigrants "now share preeminence in the most demanding and remunerative occupations in the foreign-born professional work force." But in fact, foreign-born Asian professionals are now outdistancing," numerically, their white counterparts in engineering, math and various science branches.

Demographic change and current migration patterns are likely to produce an even greater Asian presence in these high-income professions and a corresponding decline in the number, attainment and incomes of white professionals, the report observes.

However, the CIS report mentions that India, China and Japan have shown a greater immunity to the trend, than other non-Asian groups. But the flow of professionals from Asia has displayed some of the decline in educational attainments.

CIS says that "another neglected question that will not go away is whether America's heavy intake of the poor regions' best and brightest professionals is in the best interest of these skill-short developing nations."

"The preponderance of foreign professionals is from major developed nations, or advanced developing nations, some of which produce more professionals such as engineers and physicians in India -- than their national markets can absorb."

At the same time, CIS noted that, "foreign-born professionals have been a double gift to the United States. They have helped meet the needs of underserved populations and enriched scientific research and education. Moreover, they tend to have native-born children who perform well academically and in many cases will themselves become professionals."

"Though the flow of foreignborn professionals is likely to persist, because of less selective general immigration policies, however, the proper proportional share of all immigration that is professional is "likely to continue shrinking."

"Clearly, the nation's high intake of foreign professionals and candidates for professions has consequences for US minorities, the US labor market, and for the sending countries that require more systematic and careful consideration than they have received so far," the report opines.