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By Gabriel Escobar A new study of census data shows that the number of immigrants living in the United States has almost tripled since 1970, rising from 9.6 million to 26.3 million today and far outpacing the growth of the native-born population. The new figures dramatically affirm that the country is going through a remarkable transformation in just a generation's time, one that will reshape the nation's demographics and social landscape for years to come. As a percentage of the population, immigrants account for nearly one in 10 residents, the highest proportion in seven decades. The influx of newcomers has transformed communities, whether it is the Bosnians settling in St. Louis, the Russians in northeast Philadelphia, the Dominicans in New York City or the Salvadorans in Silver Spring. Even in places where immigrants have long found a home, the critical mass attained by some groups has made what was once alien intimately familiar. Jose is now the most popular name for a boy in Texas and California. The great tide of immigrants over the past three decades has disproportionately affected certain areas. Half of all immigrants are also Spanish-speaking — 27 percent coming from Mexico alone. California, New York and Florida have each seen enormous increases in immigrant populations, and attempts to correlate the phenomena with a host of urban ills continue to preoccupy researchers and policymakers. In the new study, Maryland and Virginia ranked 11th and 12th, respectively, among states with the highest number of immigrants. The District, which has been losing immigrants to the suburbs this decade, ranked 40th. Since 1990, Maryland's population of foreign-born increased by 53 percent and Virginia's by 42 percent. Ranked by the percentage increase, the states ranked ninth and 12th, respectively, nationwide. The new figures are included in a study conducted by the Center for Immigration Studies and are based on the Census Bureau's Current Population Survey for March 1998. As a percentage of the population, immigrants accounted for 9.8 percent, double the 4.8 percent registered in 1970, the study concludes. Though that percentage still is considerably less than the 14.7 percent attained in 1910, the study concludes that the tide of immigrants is having a profound, historic and generally harmful effect on the country. The center, a nonprofit organization that advocates immigration controls, concludes that the overall characteristics of this immigrant pool — poorer, less educated, more inclined to receive welfare — present an "enormous challenge." "No nation has ever attempted to incorporate over 26 million newcomers into its society," writes the report's author, Steven A. Camarota. "Without a change in immigration policy, immigration's impact will only grow as the size of the immigrant population continues to increase rapidly." Proponents and foes of immigration sometimes draw different conclusions from the same set of data or even question the numbers themselves. There is also a long and contentious debate on the impact that immigrants have on the economy. Yesterday, immigration advocates and civil rights groups did not question the numbers but did react to the center's conclusions with skepticism, resignation and even concern. "Sounding the alarm about how many of us there are, are they?" said Cecilia Munoz vice president for policy at the National Council of La Raza, a Latino civil rights organization based in Washington. "It is easy to use demographic data to alarm people," Munoz said. "But it's alarming only if you assume immigrants coming in are harmful to Americans, which they are not." The study released yesterday is based on the March 1998 statistical survey conducted by the Census Bureau, the primary purpose of which is to collect employment data. Though the survey is generally reliable, it may have undercounted the foreign-born population by as much as 10 percent; as with other surveys, the results greatly depend on the honesty of respondents. Camarota noted that immigrants account for one in seven people living in poverty and that the percentage of immigrant households on welfare is 30 percent to 50 percent higher than that of natives. Immigration and births to immigrant women, he said, account for 70 percent of the increase in the population since 1970. Using 1970 as a base for comparison was one factor cited by critics. That year the population had the lowest percentage of foreign-born residents, said Jeffrey Passel, principal research associate and demographer at the Urban Institute, which is generally viewed as favorably disposed to immigration. Passel, however, did not question the study's numbers, and he agreed that the country has gone through a dramatic transformation in the past few decades. "The statements they have made are not incorrect," he said. "And I will say that the rapid change, basically within a generation, is I think a force of some social friction." The U.S. unemployment rate is now at 4.3 percent, the lowest for any industrial nation. Stephen Moore, an economist and immigration analyst at the Cato Institute, a libertarian think tank, noted that the country's economic boom has coincided with the arrival of millions of immigrants. And while most industrial countries have an aging population and low birth rates, Moore said the immigrant tide is having an opposite effect here. "The U.S. is one of the industrialized countries that have this wonderful safety valve," Moore said. "We are getting young people through immigration. I don't see this as an alarming thing. I think it's a virtuous thing." Staff writer D'Vera Cohn contributed to this report. *** Foreign Born: The number of immigrants living in the United States has almost tripled since 1970. In millions 1930 14.3 SOURCE: Center for Immigration Studies
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