In a demographic shift touching every corner of the U.S., the Hispanic population grew faster than expected and accounted for more than half of the nation’s growth over the past decade, with the group’s increase driven by births and immigration.

The Census Bureau—in its first nationwide demographic tally from the 2010 headcount—said Thursday the U.S. Hispanic population surged 43%, rising to 50.5 million in 2010 from 35.3 million in 2000. Latinos now constitute 16% of the nation’s total population of 308.7 million.

The Census Bureau has estimated that the non-Hispanic white population would drop to 50.8% of the total population by 2040—then drop to 46.3% by 2050. This demographic transformation—Latinos now account for about one in four people under age 18—holds the potential to shift the political dynamics across the country.

“The Hispanic population is under-represented in the electorate and politically because of demographic factors,” including the high share under age 18 and the high number of immigrants, said Jeffrey Passel, a demographer at the Pew Hispanic Center. “Their presence in the electorate will increase over time.”

Nearly 92% of the nation’s population growth over the past decade—25.1 million people—came from minorities of all types, including those who identified themselves as mixed race. Nine million people, or 3%, reported more than one race.

In addition to the 16.3% of people who identified as Hispanic or Latino of any race, 63.7% identified as white; 12.2% identified as black; 4.7% as Asian; and 0.7% as American Indians or Alaska Natives. Other races made up the rest.

States in the South and West posted the sharpest growth rates during the decade, with the population of the West surpassing the Midwest for the first time. More than half the U.S. lived in the 10 most populous states, with about a quarter in the three largest states: California, Texas and New York.

The Census Bureau said the population continued shifting toward the South and West, which together accounted for 84% of the decade’s population growth. The nation’s center of population—the balancing point if all 308 million people weighed the same—moved about 25 miles south to just outside Plato, Mo. In 1790, the year of the first Census, the population center was near Chestertown, Md.

The Census data also showed blacks moving out of big cities in the North and into suburbs and the South, marking more black-white integration.

Two cities, New York and Washington, saw their black populations decline. The District of Columbia notched its first decennial population increase since the 1940s, rising to 601,700 despite an 11% drop in blacks. But the non-Hispanic black population in the nation’s capital was just 50% in 2010, as the non-Hispanic white population jumped almost a third to 209,000.

New York City’s population inched up 2.1%, bringing the 2010 total to 8.2 million. The city’s non-Hispanic black population declined for the first time since 1860, according to William Frey, a demographer at the Brookings Institution. While not substantial, the 5.1 % decline is in line with other urban centers that posted declines, Mr. Frey said. New York City’s growth was fueled by increases in its Asian and Hispanic populations. The city’s white population fell slightly, by 2.8%.

“We’ve moved to an African-American population that, at least for a lot of young people, is becoming much more mainstream than 20 years ago in terms of where they want to live and how they see themselves in American life,” Mr. Frey said. “It’s affecting the way suburbs are growing. It’s changing the way the South is growing.”

The increasing racial diversity among U.S. children underscored a shift that is likely to make whites a minority in the early 2040s. Of the entire Hispanic population, children make up about one-third, compared with one-fifth among whites.

The total number of people under age 18 rose by nearly two million over the decade. But the number of white children fell, while the number of Hispanic children rose sharply. During the decade, Texas alone added 979,000 individuals under age 18, of which 931,000 were Hispanic.

“That can tell you as much as anything how important Hispanics are for the future of children in the United States,” Mr. Frey said. Of the states gaining people, “they owe it to Hispanics.”

Latinos moved increasingly into such states as Arkansas, Georgia, Kentucky and Maryland. North Carolina and other states that previously had smaller Hispanic populations saw similar growth—a trend demographers say is likely to continue in the next decade. “The migration streams that have been established tend to be somewhat self-reinforcing,” Mr. Passel said. “Once a migration stream gets established to a new place, more migrants tend to go there.”

February 22, 2011

American Universities Have Major Stake in Immigration Reform, Speaker Says

By Karin Fischer

San Francisco

If the United States doesn’t reform its immigration system, it risks a vast “brain hemorrhage,” as American-educated Indian and Chinese engineers and entrepreneurs return to their own countries, the scholar and entrepreneur Vivek Wadhwa said in a provocative speech on Tuesday at the annual meeting here of the Association of International Education Administrators. And American universities have much at stake in reform, he said.

Mr. Wadhwa, who holds appointments at Duke University, Harvard Law School, and the University of California at Berkeley, said the United States was squandering the competitive edge of its higher-education system by allowing one million highly educated immigrants to linger in immigration limbo because of tight caps on visas. And that outmigration could eventually affect American universities, rendering them “obsolete,” he said.

“The United States is headed for massive reverse brain drain,” said Mr. Wadhwa, who is also a columnist for Business Week and an adviser to a number of startup companies.

“The outflow is happening too fast to be good for the United States,” he said. “It’s happening too much too fast.”

America’s innovation economy, Mr. Wadhwa pointed out, owes much to imported talent. A quarter of all patent applications filed in this country are the work of foreign nationals.

From 1995 to 2005, 25 percent of all startup companies had at least one immigrant founder. The number was even higher among new high-tech enterprises—in Silicon Valley, more than half of all companies were started by immigrants. A disproportionate number of startups were founded by immigrants from India, he added.

But current U.S. immigration policy is hostile to those very entrepreneurs, Mr. Wadhwa said. Each year the United States issues only 65,000 H1-B visas, which allow international workers in certain high-tech and specialty fields to be employed in this country, and the federal government tightly caps the number of green cards granted annually to immigrants from individual countries. More than one million foreigners now in the United States are waiting for one of 120,000 permanent-resident visas issued annually to skilled workers.

As a consequence, he said, young and well-educated workers from abroad must return to their home countries. The average age of Indians now returning home from America is 30, and Chinese returnees are, on average, 33.

‘Get Out of Their Shells’

American universities are helping fuel the roaring economies overseas, particularly in India, which does not even produce enough engineering doctorates to staff its own universities.

What’s more, many international students increasingly believe that the “grass is indeed greener back home,” Mr. Wadhwa said.

Just a few years ago, Mr. Wadhwa said, when he would ask his international students at Duke whether they wanted to stay permanently in the United States, most said they did. Today, he said, most plan to work in this country for just a few years and then return home.

As part of his research, Mr. Wadhwa used Facebook to poll foreign students at American universities: Fewer than 10 percent of Chinese students and just 6 percent of Indian students surveyed said they wanted to permanently emigrate to the United States.

Given those trends, Mr. Wadhwa said, a decade from now it’s unlikely that 50 percent of all companies will have immigrant founders, a trend that could pose serious consequences for American competitiveness and innovation.

“We’re getting more xenophobic, anti-immigrant, just when we need them,” he said of American policy and political rhetoric.

Mr. Wadhwa also dismissed as “garbage” American academic studies that suggest such competitiveness concerns are overblown.

American universities, Mr. Wadhwa said, have to “get out of their shells” and become greater advocates for immigration reform. Otherwise, they risk becoming “obsolete.”

As more well-educated Chinese and Indian nationals opt to return or remain in their home countries, he said, the quality of universities there will improve, making them more competitive on a world stage.

Over the next decade “Silicon Valley-class universities” will develop in those countries, Mr. Wadhwa said. “American students will want to go there—we’ll be left out.”

Alejandro Mayorkas, USCIS Director stated that U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services celebrates the Constitution and Citizenship Day every year in commemoration of the signing of the U.S. Constitution. He further added that, although U.S. citizens are diverse in their individual backgrounds, they are brought together by their respect for the Constitution.

As part of the Constitution and Citizenship Day commemoration, USCIS welcomed 25 new citizens at the foot of the General Grant’s Tree on Sept. 15, 2010. This tree is the largest giant sequoia in the Sequoia-Kings Canyon National Park in Three Rivers, California. This ceremony was followed by the naturalization of 60 citizens at the Jefferson National Expansion Memorial, St. Louis, Mo on Sept. 17, 2010. Another highlight of this Constitution and Citizenship Day commemoration is the cornerstone ceremony that was hosted by USCIS at the Lincoln Memorial on Sept. 22, 2010.

In addition to these ceremonies, U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services also held several other national parks ceremonies. Several other locations where USCIS held these special ceremonies include Grand Canyon, Homestead National Monument, the Herbert Hoover National Historic Site in Lowa, the Harry S. Truman Library and Museum in Independence, Mo., the historic Fenway Park in Boston, Massachusetts, the Clinton Presidential Library and Museum in Little Rock, Arkansas, and the Angel Island State Park in the middle of San Francisco Bay.

Visa applicants can get all the queries regarding U.S. immigration processes clarified at www.usa-green-card.com.

Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano said the U.S. deported a record 392,862 illegal immigrants and arrested more of their employers this past year than ever before.

Nearly half, 190,000, of those removed by the Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency in the fiscal year ended Sept. 30 had criminal records. That figure is 70% higher than the number of people with records deported in the fiscal year ended Sept. 30, 2008, Ms. Napolitano told a news conference Wednesday.

She said the administration of President Barack Obama has purposely targeted illegal immigrants who have been convicted of offenses in the U.S. Those crimes range from murder and sexual assault to misdemeanors, such as minor drug offenses and disorderly conduct.

The White House has also stepped up punishment of those who employ illegal workers. In fiscal 2010, the department scrutinized the employment records of more than 2,200 companies, up from 1,400 the previous year, Ms. Napolitano said.

In the past year, the department criminally charged a record 180 owners, employers and managers, compared with 114 in 2009. Since January 2009, it has imposed about $50 million in fines on businesses that employed illegal immigrants.

Last month, for instance, clothing retailer Abercrombie & Fitch agreed to pay $1.04 million to settle charges that the company had deficiencies in its employee-verification system.

“ICE has increased the audit and prosecution of employers who repeatedly and egregiously hire illegal workers,” Ms. Napolitano said.

About 11 million illegal immigrants reside in the U.S., according to Department of Homeland Security estimates.

The Obama administration is under pressure to show it is tough on illegal immigration as candidates for Congress and local office from Nebraska to California focus on the issue ahead of the Nov. 2 midterm election.

The White House also faces Hispanic voters frustrated with stepped-up enforcement and scant progress towards an immigration overhaul that would give illegal immigrants a path towards citizenship. Critics of the program say it wastes resources by arresting minor offenders.

Julie Myers, chief of Immigration and Customs Enforcement during the Bush Administration between 2006 and 2008, commended the stepped up enforcement but said much of the department’s focus has been on small employers. “To make the program overall more effective the way they are seeking, ICE is going to have to bring substantial cases against large employers, as well,” she said.

Ms. Napolitano credited a fast-expanding enforcement program begun in 2008, dubbed Secure Communities, for the steep increase in the deportations. Under the program, law-enforcement officials check the immigration status and the fingerprints of prisoners against national databases. More than 650 localities across the U.S. now participate in the program. The department said it was on track to expand the program to all law-enforcement jurisdictions nationwide by 2013.

Immigrant advocates attribute the surge in deportations to the agency’s apprehension of foreigners who did not commit any crime other than entering the U.S. legally and overstaying their visas. The department has rejected that assertion.

USCIS is primarily funded by the fees paid for applications and petitions by individuals seeking immigration benefits. The fee is accountable for about 90 percent of USCIS’s budget. In order to verify that U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services are not facing any loss of income, review of its fee structure every two years has been made mandatory by the law.

Alejandro Mayorkas, Director of U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services, expressed that USCIS is considerate about the effect of this proposed fee hike on the people. He also added that USCIS is also analyzing other cost cutting measures in order to reduce the impact of the proposed fee increase. Taking into account, the importance of becoming the citizens of the United States and the significant advantage it offers to the nation, the application fee for naturalization has not been increased.

Since the fiscal year 2008, the revenue generated from the fee for immigration benefit applications and petitions has remained low. Although there have been budgets cuts of around $160 million, under the recommendations from Congress, they were not adequate to compensate between the costs and expected revenue. Therefore, altering the fee structure by the proposed rule was inevitable in order to recover the costs.

In the proposed fee structure three new fees are intended to be added. They include a fee for Applications on regional center designations under the Immigrant Investor Pilot Program, a fee for Applications on Civil Surgeon Designation, and a fee to recover the cost involved in processing immigrant visas granted by the Department of State. Further, as the processing costs are low, the processing fees for certain individual applications and petitions will be reduced.
The public views on the proposed rule can be posted through www.regulations.gov till July 26, 2010.

Of the 81 members included in this USCIS naturalization ceremony, 57 members belonged to the U.S. armed forces, 22 were spouses, and two were children of members of military located across South Korea.

Kenneth Sherman, USCIS Seoul Field Office Director, after directing the Oath of Allegiance in the citizenship ceremony, stated that though the month of May is dedicated as a mark of respect to the military, it is has always been a priority of USCIS to extend their support to the Military officers and their families every day. He also added that their commitment to defend the United States of America prior to naturalization has only served as an inspiration to ensure that the military community receives quality immigration services in any place they are stationed.

Maj. Gen. Lawrence L. Wells, Deputy Chief of Staff for the United Nations Command and U.S. Forces Korea, said that he felt proud to see the American service men and women administer the Oath of Allegiance during their naturalization oath ceremony while they already serve the U.S armed forces. The army personnel who were naturalized belonged to 30 different countries. More than 59,300 service personnel have been naturalized since September 2001 where 889 became citizens in ceremonies held in South Korea.

The National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2004 has facilitated persons serving in the military to become citizens of United States even while they are in service at a foreign nation. Prior to this, the military service members were to be present in the United States for the naturalization ceremony to take place.

The secretary stated that the strong base of the national security was built by the patriotic service and unselfish sacrifices of the men and women of the armed forces. Speeding up the citizenship process will definitely show the country’s dedication and tribute to the new citizens (men and women of armed forces) who have come from various parts of the globe to serve the country.

In order to receive naturalization through military service, the time requirement was reduced from three years to one year for the applicants who served in time of peace. This rule was recompensed with DHS regulations and conformed to the National Defense Authorization Act, 2004. On the other hand, the Reserve of the Ready Reserve of the U.S. Armed Forces can have extended benefits. According to the rule, selected members who served in active-duty status or in the Selected Reserve of the Ready Reserve for any time from September 11, 2001, can apply for citizenship.

The members of the military need not file biographic information forms (Form G-325B) along with their naturalization applications. It helps in removing administrative repetitions and to increase efficiency for the workers who lost their lives in order to safeguard the nation.

Receiving naturalization is becoming a citizen of the country, DHS has a procedure and provides different forms (eg. N-600K, N-400K etc.) to receive naturalization for different age group. The Department of Homeland Security helps you in U. S. immigration and citizenship process required for members of the military and their families.

Michele Lowe, spokesperson of the census bureau has said that in the 2010 Census, the bureau will tabulate handwritten entries specifying whether the respondent belongs to a Central American indigenous group such as Maya, Nahua, Mixtec, or Purepecha. The list of different populations that end up being counted will be made public when results are released in 2011. This will give a complete portrait of the American people. The 2010 census will show us that there are a lot of indigenous immigrants in America.

An accurate count of the indigenous immigrants in the 2010 census is very essential to themselves and to the federal government for allocating funds to the state and local governments. The indigenous immigrant population speaks many different languages making it hard to campaign for the 2010 survey. But several, Indigenous organizations are working independently within their communities to dispel the hesitation and encourage participation in the 2010 census survey through organizing workshops, public forums, flyers, and radio broadcasts. Jonathan Fox, a professor of Latin American and Latino Studies at the University of California, Santa Cruz states that “more indigenous migrants are willing to come out in public and claim their ethnic identity.”

The global economic downturn spurred declines in physical immigration — the movement of people across borders — in 2008 and 2009. But a new Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas report says “virtual” immigration — moving the work rather than the workers — continued to grow.

“Most likely, the difference stems from the jobs the two types of immigrants typically do,” authors Michael Cox, Richard Alm and Justyna Dymerska write in the Dallas Fed’s Economic Letter. “Physical immigrants work in construction and other highly cyclical industries. Virtual immigrants are more likely to work in the services economy. It has traditionally been less sensitive than goods to cyclical fluctuations, largely because services aren’t subject to the kind of inventory bulges that make goods production unstable.”

Still, virtual immigration increased at a slower pace during the downturn. “Hard times might pressure companies to cut costs, quickening offshoring’s pace,” they write. “At the same time, companies might pull back on offshoring because of cuts in IT budgets and plentiful labor close to home.”   For instance, India’s exports in software and IT services are forecast to continue expanding. But the projected growth rate of 17% for 2009 is less than half the pace of the prior four years.