The number of immigrant workers in the United States hits a new high

The share of immigrant workers in the US workforce hit a record high last year, according to new data from the Department of Labor (DOL) .

New government data for 2022 reveals that nearly 1 in 5 workers were born outside the United States to non-US citizen parents, a record proportion of the workforce.

That reverses a drop that was recorded during the Covid pandemic, when the share of foreign-born workers fell, an unusual reversal in a trend that has been rising since at least 1996.

The share of immigrants in the workforce rose to 18.1% last year , up from 17.4% in 2021, the Labor Department's Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) said in its report.

The number of foreign-born workers in the United States rose to 29.8 million in 2022 , from 27.9 million the year before, an increase of about 6%.

The number of native workers went from 133.2 million to 134.5 million, barely 1%.

Foreign-born workers had an unemployment rate of 3.4% in 2022, compared to 3.7% for people born in the US, the BLS said.

What kinds of jobs do immigrants have?

Foreign-born workers are more likely than U.S.-born workers to work in service industry, natural resources, construction and maintenance jobs, the government said. They are also more likely to work in production, transportation, and material moving jobs.

By comparison, US-born workers are more likely to work in managerial and professional positions.

Despite the policies against them, immigrants are doing their job

Immigration rebounded last year, according to US Census data, which found the nation experienced the largest single-year increase in immigrants since 2010. About 1 million people immigrated to the US in 2022, an increase from its recent low of 376,000 people in 2021, according to that federal agency.

A key factor is that a higher proportion of the immigrant population is of working age (18-64), at 77%, according to the Migration Policy Institute (MPI), a nonpartisan organization dedicated to analyzing global immigration. and from the US That compares to about 59% of the native population.

Opponents of immigration could look at the record number of foreign-born workers and argue that foreign-born workers are somehow stealing jobs from Americans, but that's not what's happening.

Although there was a large increase in net immigration in 2022, essentially catching up with the COVID slump, there were plenty of jobs to go around, as according to Commerce Department data in its February 2023 monthly report, the unemployment rate it reached only 3.4%, the lowest rate in 54 years.

The data comes at a time when immigration is in the spotlight due to the expiration of Title 42, an emergency immigration restriction that allowed the US to expel millions of migrants to Mexico or their countries of origin due to the covid pandemic.

Meanwhile, some states, like Texas and Florida, are moving forward with new laws to end immigration.