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Title: Some counties gain more foreigners than U.S.-born
Source:
AZ Central
URL Source: http://www.azcentral.com/specials/s ... /articles/0526migration26.html
Published: May 26, 2005
Author: Jon Kamman
Post Date: 2005-06-30 10:57:29 by Mr Nuke Buzzcut
Keywords: foreigners, U.S.-born, counties
Views: 30
Comments: 2
Some counties gain more foreigners than U.S.-born Jon Kamman Two migration patterns, closely linked, are sweeping across population centers of U.S. states along the Mexican border. Many counties are absorbing more migrants from other nations than from within the United States. And in an even more dramatic shift, some of the counties are seeing more U.S. residents move out than U.S. residents move in. Together, the trends are escalating the concentration of foreigners in Southwestern counties that, until the 1990s, depended on newcomers from other parts of the United States for the bulk of their growth. The extent of high foreign immigration, coupled with declining or reversing domestic migration, is revealed in an analysis of the latest Census Bureau estimates of county population changes, covering April 2000 to July 2002. The Arizona Republic examined counties with populations of more than 100,000 across Southern California, Arizona, New Mexico and Texas. In 31 of the 53 counties, or nearly 60 percent, more foreign than domestic immigrants moved in. At the same time, in 22 counties, or more than 40 percent, more U.S. residents moved out than in. In other words, their populations would have declined without foreign immigration. Arizona has been the least affected because its urban centers remain a stronger magnet for people moving cross-country than across international borders. The ratio, narrowing rapidly in the Phoenix and Tucson areas, has reversed in Yuma County, along the Mexican border. While gaining about 3,500 migrants from foreign countries, Yuma County saw about 200 more U.S. residents leave than arrive. Across the Southwest, the growing proportion of foreign immigrants poses important economic, social and political questions in the intense debate over the costs and benefits of a nation absorbing the largest number of immigrants in its history. It also raises the specter of "White flight," a term liberally applied in previous decades to the abandonment of central cities by middle-class residents fleeing to suburbs. Experts caution against assuming that an influx of foreigners is, of itself, causing tenured residents to move out. "There may be a little bit of prejudice involved in this, but it's much more than that," said William Frey, a Brookings Institution and University of Michigan demographer. "When people move long distances, it has a lot to do with money," Frey said. Jobs, family, education, health, retirement and other personal factors play major roles, he said. In census data, any non-U.S. citizen moving into the United States from a foreign country is classified as a foreign immigrant. No distinction is made between those who immigrate legally and those who do not. The Republic found that across the 53-county region, an average of seven immigrants from outside the United States moved in for every net gain of one person from inside the country. "The inner counties are more and more dependent on (international) immigration as their source of growth," Frey said. Meanwhile, the accelerating domestic exodus comes into sharp focus in an examination of the top three "magnet" counties for international immigration in each state. For every three foreigners moving in, those 12 counties together had a net loss of one U.S. resident. It's a dramatic turnaround from past migration patterns. By contrast, as recently as 1995-2000, for every three foreigners moving in, the 12 counties also had a net gain of nearly five residents from within the United States. Among other highlights of the analysis are: * Foreign immigration has become the No. 2 source of growth for Maricopa County. On an average day, 85 migrants arrive from abroad, compared with 84 births in excess of deaths. * The county's growth now comes 40 percent from people moving within the United States, 30 percent from foreign countries and a fractionally lower 30 percent from births. One reason for the exodus of current residents from some counties, Frey suggested in a study last year, is that earlier foreign immigrants are moving away to find better job opportunities, a lower cost of living and other amenities in areas less flooded by new immigrants. "Now the longer-term foreigners are competing with the shorter-term foreigners, as well," Frey said. Anyone moving out of a county after a year of residence is counted as a domestic mover. Frey cautioned that the latest census estimates may overstate the degree of foreign immigration, just as they underestimated it in the 1990s. Also, some of the data for county outflows should be viewed in terms of whether people are actually leaving a metropolitan area or just hopping across a county line in the same metropolitan region, he said. The overwhelming majority of foreign immigrants to the Southwest are from Latin America, and studies show they often arrive impoverished, poorly educated and with few job skills. They bring the benefits of foreign culture, a strong work ethic and a willingness to do low-wage jobs shunned by U.S. workers, but they also present major challenges for the areas in which large numbers of them settle. Difficulties range from providing health care for people who can't pay for it to supplying shelter, food and jobs for workers whose education and skills do not match their eagerness to work. In places that once attracted mostly domestic movers, the wave of foreigners is creating separate cultures, Frey said. "There's a whopping increase in segregation between Hispanics and Whites, and a whopping increase in the number of foreign-born who don't speak English very well."
Poster Comment:
Southwest experiencing demographic shift
The Arizona Republic
May. 26, 2003 12:00 AM * Only two of the 12 magnet counties, Maricopa and Pima, had higher domestic than foreign immigration.
"That's amazing," said migration expert Kevin McHugh, associate professor of geography at Arizona State University. Before 1990, international migration accounted for no more than 10 percent of growth in the area, census data show.
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#1. To: *The Border* (#0)
ping!
"Anyone who has proclaimed violence his method inexorably must choose lying as his principle." - Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn
La Reconquista, viva la raza! The strength of the vampire is that no one believes in him.
#2. To: Mr Nuke Buzzcut, tauzero (#0)
"There's a whopping increase in segregation between Hispanics and Whites, and a whopping increase in the number of foreign-born who don't speak English very well."
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