California, Here We Come

IMMIGRATION optimism abounds among pundits and politicians—and understandably. America over time has absorbed countless immigrants. But as official reports and demographic trends reveal, immigrants are becoming America’s new underclass.

On April 8, the Bureau of the Census released a report entitled, The Foreign-Born Population: 1996. It is sobering. Median personal income for immigrants is $14,772, compared to $17,835 for natives. The poverty rate for the foreign-born is 22.2 per cent, in contrast to the native rate of 12.9 per cent. And among children the numbers are worse. In 1993, 41 per cent of immigrant children lived in poverty, as compared to 22 per cent of native children. Most troubling of all is that 35.6 per cent of immigrants are not high-school graduates, versus only 16 per cent of natives.

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Linda Thom

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IMMIGRATION optimism abounds among pundits and politicians—and understandably. America over time has absorbed countless immigrants. But as official reports and demographic trends reveal, immigrants are becoming America’s new underclass.

On April 8, the Bureau of the Census released a report entitled, The Foreign-Born Population: 1996. It is sobering. Median personal income for immigrants is $14,772, compared to $17,835 for natives. The poverty rate for the foreign-born is 22.2 per cent, in contrast to the native rate of 12.9 per cent. And among children the numbers are worse. In 1993, 41 per cent of immigrant children lived in poverty, as compared to 22 per cent of native children. Most troubling of all is that 35.6 per cent of immigrants are not high-school graduates, versus only 16 per cent of natives.