The 2017 Apple Worldwide Developers Conference & Facebook F8 2017, at the San Jose Convention Center. Image Credit: Minh Nguyen
While President Donald Trump’s high-pitched positions continue to cast immigration as a contentious issue, a substantial majority of Americans views immigrants as a source of strength for the United States than being a burden.
Six in ten American adults – 59% percent – believe immigrants “make the country stronger because of their work and talents,” according to a Pew Research Center report.
On the other hand, one-third (34%) of Americans say immigrants are a burden because they” take jobs and social benefits,” according to the report based on a survey of public opinion conduced in 2018.
Perceptions about immigrants in the United states – home to the largest number of immigrants in the world – have shown a marked improvement since the 1990s, when most Americans said immigrants were a burden to the country.
The trend coincides with an array of developments including the influx of the best and the brightest from around the world during the emergence of IT as a big economy-shaping dynamic.
Americans’ views about immigrants vary along political lines, with the left and Democrats favoring the role of immigrants. President Trump has pushed immigration to the center stage of politics since his 2016 campaign.
Although the White House favors immigration of skilled workers, portrayal of illegal immigrants as a drain on the country combined with reversal of status for many immigrants protected previously under programs like Dreamers Act and TPS and ban on entry of new visitors from several Muslim-majority countries have found a large following among Conservatives.
The Institute of Immigration Research found in a study that immigrants from travel ban-affected countries have higher rates of educational attainment compared to all other immigrants living in the United States and native-born U.S. citizens.
The findings shed light on how measures stopping immigration from the banned countries could affect the United States.
“Nearly half of foreign born individuals 25 years of age and older from a travel ban-affected country have either a bachelor’s, graduate, and/or doctoral degree (46 percent), compared to under one-third of all other immigrants (28 percent) and native-born U.S. citizens (30 percent).”
Many GOP leaders use illegal immigrants as a rallying cry in the never-ending political season.
Several recent studies have revealed that the United States – due to aging demographics and economic imperatives – will need constant influx of skilled and labor workforce to sustain higher growth into the future.
Data also shows that immigrants have founded many of the top tech and profitable companies in the United States in the last few years.
On the academic horizon, the year 2016, when the then candidate Donald Trump pushed immigration to the front-burner, Americans got a reality check. Six of the seven Nobel Prize winners were immigrants.
But as evidenced from the intense focus on the ongoing immigration crisis on the Mexican border, it is the question of dealing with illegal immigrants that divides the Americans.
According to the Pew survey findings, nearly half (46%) of the public supports deporting immigrants residing in the country illegally. The remaining half of Americans (47%) opposes their deportation.
The Pew Research Center reckons about 10.7 million unauthorized immigrants lived in the U.S. in 2016 – a turning point in the debate on the issue.
The number represented less than a quarter (23.7%) of the U.S. immigrant population.
But the number of unauthorized immigrants living in the United States has been declining since 2007 and, according to Pew Research, is now at levels last seen in 2004.
Attitudes towards immigrants are also formed on the grounds of culture and ongoing issues including crime and terrorism.
The Pew Research report shows along with Japanese, Mexicans, South Africans, French and Swedes, most of Americans 54 percent say feel immigrants want to adopt the host country’s customs and way of life.
Despite attempts by several groups to link immigrants to crime, 77 percent of Americans believe immigrants are not more to blame for crime than other groups. Similarly, 56 percent of American say immigrants do not increase the risk of terrorism in the country.
