Las Vegas Sun

March 29, 2024

Las Vegas Sol:

Data dump: Nevada’s Hispanic population grows steadily but isn’t fastest in U.S.

State and U.S. population of immigrants without legal residency decreases

Nevada is home to the 14th largest Hispanic population in the country, according to new data from the Pew Research Center.

The center's report "Statistical Portrait of Hispanics in the United States, 2011" was released Feb. 15 and shows Nevada's Hispanic population increased 66 percent from 2000 to 2011, from 444,718 to 738,295.

California has the largest Hispanic population by far with 14.4 million, and when combined with runner-up Texas' 9.8 million Hispanics, the two states hold 47 percent of the nation's Hispanic population.

South Carolina saw the largest percentage increase in the nation among its Hispanic population from 2000 to 2011, going from 94,652 to 240,884, for an increase of 154.5 percent.

The report draws on the U.S. Census Bureau's 2011 American Community Survey for its analysis, and is chock full of tables and charts breaking down everything from language spoken at home to rates of home ownership, fertility rates and representation in different industries.

Some key findings:

The share of native-born Hispanics is increasing while the share of foreign-born Hispanics declines.

The median age of the U.S. Hispanic population is 27, lower than blacks, 33, Asians, 36, and whites, 42.

While the average income in a Hispanic household is below the U.S. average, educational attainment has been on the rise for Hispanics since 2000.

On the same day the Pew Research Center released its report, the Center for Migration Studies released new data on the nation's unauthorized immigrant population in its journal "International Migration Review."

According to the study, 180,000 immigrants with no legal residency status were living in Nevada in 2010, ranking it the 14th largest such population in the country.

The study estimated the total U.S. unauthorized immigrant population to be approximately 11.7 million in January 2010, roughly 4 million more than in 2000, which is in line with previous estimates from the Department of Homeland Security and the Pew Research Center.

The study's findings show the population is dynamic, with significant return migration each year.

The report concludes the number of unauthorized immigrants arriving in the country each year peaked at more than one million in 1999 to 2001, and then declined rapidly through 2009.

"The unauthorized immigrant population reached zero growth after 2007 because arrivals dropped sharply after 2001 and the numbers leaving the population steadily increased. In 2009, 384,314 persons entered the U.S. unauthorized population, and 558,118 left. Thus, even though the U.S. unauthorized immigrant population has essentially reached zero growth, unauthorized immigration to the United States continues at a significant level," the center reported in a summary of the study.

According to the study there were 26,000 unauthorized immigrants in Nevada in 1990, the number steadily increased and peaked at 189,118 in 2007. It declined every year since then, for an estimate of 179,711 in 2010. In 2007, 2008 and 2009 the number of immigrants without a legal residency status entering the Silver State was fewer than the number "leaving," which the study defines as people who emigrated, were removed by authorities, died or had their status adjusted.

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