Pakistani origin scientist Nergis Mavalvalva Image Credit: John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation/Wikimedia Commons
It’s an open secret that one of the major factors contributing to America’s advancement in research and innovation has been its embrace of highly educated immigrants since the 20th century,
More recently, immigrant achievers including IT entrepreneurs, medical doctors, business owners and scientists have brought the United States a unique set of talents to scale new levels of progress.
But the ongoing debate on immigration, President Trump’s wall on Mexican border and national security often focuses on undocumented workers with varying degrees of skills.
Sounding like a reminder in the heated debate, a new study reveals that America is home to more college-educated immigrants than any other developed country. The findings also highlight the U.S. capacity to take in more educated immigrants.
According to Pew Research Center, by 2015 – a year before immigration jumped to the center of political rhetoric – the United States had 14.7 million immigrants ages 25 and older with a postsecondary diploma or college degree.
That means the U.S. has more than triple the number college-educated immigrants than Canada (4.4 million) and more than four times as many as in the United Kingdom (3.4 million).
A Pew Research Center report, released early this year, indicates that the United States has the capacity to further build on its share of highly skilled immigrants.
Currently, third (36%) of all immigrants in the U.S. have a college degree. The share lags behind Canada, which has 65% of immigrants with college degrees. The United Kingdom has 49% of immigrants with high education degrees.
The study also finds that the U.S. immigrant population is better educated than ever. The Pew research suggests it could be partly due to increased schooling in origin countries and a boost in high-skilled workers arriving from Asia and Africa.
Among the leading avenues to U.S. immigration for highly educated immigrants are H-1B visa program, the F-1 visa program, the Optional Practical Training program and green cards. China and India have the largest number of postsecondary education immigrants among the foreign-born population.
