Labor Dept: 18.1% Of US Workforce Is Foreign-Born

Axios reports:

The share of foreign-born workers in the U.S. labor force reached a record high last year, per new data from the Labor Department. With more Americans aging out of the workforce than entering into it — and at a time of labor shortages — immigrants are playing an increasingly crucial role in the labor market.

The share of foreign-born people in the workforce has been steadily rising for decades, but dipped during the pandemic — making last year’s uptick look a bit more striking than it is, said Abraham Mosisa, a senior economist at the Bureau of Labor Statistics.

One key factor is that a bigger share of the immigrant population is of working age (18-64), at 77%, according to the nonpartisan Migration Policy Institute (MPI). That compares with about 59% of the native-born population.

Read the full article.

The number of foreign-born workers in the U.S. increased to 29.8 million in 2022, from 27.9 million the previous year — a jump of about 6%.https://t.co/MIZ04wv9gc

— Axios (@axios) May 26, 2023