Over 800,000 Indians Moved to U.S. in Seven Years

Over 8.3 lakh Indians moved to the United States in seven years between 2010 and 2017, the highest among all countries, according to the U.S. Census Bureau which released data from the 2017 American Community Survey (ACS).

According to the survey, there has been a significant growth in the population of both legal and illegal migrants living in the United States. The number of migrants from Asia, Sub-Saharan Africa, and Latin America other than Mexico grew while the number from Mexico, Europe, and Canada stayed flat or declined.

As far as Indian immigrants are concerned, about 830,215 Indians moved to the United States between 2010 and 2017. In 1990, there were 450,406 Indians in America, and by the turn of the century i.e. in 2000, the number grew  to 1,022,552. The figure number increased to 1,780,322 in 2010, 2,434,524 in 2016 and 2,610,534 in 2017. The increase of 830,215 persons between 2016 and 2017 marked 47 percent growth of Indians in the United States.

The “foreign-born” immigrants includes all those who were not U.S. citizens at birth. It includes those immigrants who later obtained U.S. citizenship, as well as green card holders, temporary foreign workers, and students.

The Census Bureau’s Current Population Survey (CPS) said that there were 45.4 million migrants in the United States in 2017, an increase of 1.6 million over the previous year, indicating that the pace of growth has accelerated. Migrants comprised 13.7 percent or nearly one in seven U.S. residents in 2017, the highest percentage in 107 years.

A major shift was marked in the background of newcomers, with the number of those from Asia overtaking immigrants from Latin America in the country. As many as 41 percent of the people who arrived in the United States since 2010 were from Asia while only 39 percent were from Latin America.

For many years, the maximum number of immigrants came from Mexico. But since 2010, the number of people coming from Mexico has decreased, while that from China and India has increased.  

Since 2010, the increase in the number of Asian people — 2.6 million — was more than double of the 1.2 million people who came from Latin America. 

The level of education among new arrivals was also recorded to be higher than those who arrived earlier. About 45 percent of the immigrants since 2010 were college educated, marking an increase of 15 percent from those who came between 2000 and 2009.