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Explanation:
After long constituting the bulk of migration to the United States, European immigration has largely declined since 1960. Following the end of communism in the 1990s, European arrivals slightly increased, but the population has more recently begun to shrink again. In 2016, about 4.8 million Europeans lived in the United States, accounting for 11 percent of the roughly 44 million U.S. immigrants—down from 75 percent in 1960.
The first significant European immigration wave, spanning the 16th to 18th centuries, consisted mostly of settlers from the British Isles attracted by economic opportunity and religious freedom. These early immigrants were a mix of well-to-do individuals and indentured servants. Irish, German, and Scandinavian immigrants arriving during the 1840s and 1850s made up the second wave of European immigration, fleeing famine, religious persecution, and political conflicts. Unlike the first Europeans, who were mostly Protestants, the new arrivals were overwhelmingly Catholic. They came from much poorer backgrounds and were younger and less skilled.
After a pause in European immigration during the U.S. Civil War, more than 20 million immigrants arrived—primarily from Southern and Eastern Europe—between 1880 and 1920. Most Southern European immigrants were motivated by economic opportunity in the United States, while Eastern Europeans (primarily Jews) fled religious persecution. World War I slowed European immigration, and the national-origin quotas established in 1921 and 1924—which gave priority to Western and Northern Europeans—coupled with the Great Depression and the onset of World War II brought immigration from Europe to a near halt.
Even though the 1965 Immigration Act did away with country quotas, by then fewer Europeans were seeking to cross the Atlantic either because their economic fortunes had improved during postwar reconstruction or because their communist governments restricted emigration. The fall of the Iron Curtain in the early 1990s ushered in the most recent wave of European immigration, dominated by people from Eastern Europe and the former Soviet Union. The number of European immigrants in the United States has declined slightly since 2000
In 2016, most Europeans who obtained lawful permanent residence in the United States (also known as getting a green card) did so as immediate relatives of U.S. citizens or through employment channels. Compared to the overall foreign- and native-born populations, European immigrants on average are significantly older and more educated and have higher household incomes, though they are less likely to participate in the labor force. Sociodemographic and economic characteristics vary considerably by European country of birth, however.
Using data from the U.S. Census Bureau (the most recent 2016 American Community Survey [ACS] as well as pooled 2012–16 ACS data), the Department of Homeland Security’s Yearbook of Immigration Statistics, and the World Bank’s annual remittance data, this Spotlight provides information on the European population in the United States, focusing on its size, geographic distribution, and socioeconomic characteristics.
Definitions
The U.S. Census Bureau defines the foreign born as individuals who had no U.S. citizenship at birth. The foreign-born population includes naturalized citizens, lawful permanent residents, refugees and asylees, legal nonimmigrants (including those on student, work, or other temporary visas), and persons residing in the country without authorization.
The terms foreign born and immigrant are used interchangeably and refer to those who were born in another country and later emigrated to the United States.
Data collection constraints do not permit inclusion of those who gained European citizenship via naturalization and later moved to the United States.
The U.S. Census Bureau defines European regions as:
Northern Europe includes Denmark, Finland, Iceland, Ireland, Norway, Sweden, and the United Kingdom.
Western Europe includes Austria, Belgium, France, Germany, Liechtenstein, Luxembourg, Monaco, the Netherlands, and Switzerland.
Southern Europe includes Greece, Italy, Malta, Portugal, and Spain.
Eastern Europe includes Albania, Belarus, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Bulgaria, Croatia, Czech Republic, Czechoslovakia, Estonia, Hungary, Kosovo, Latvia, Lithuania, Macedonia, Moldova, Montenegro, Poland, Romania, Russia, Serbia, Slovakia, Slovenia, Ukraine, and Yugoslavia.
Russia may include other republics of the former Union of Soviet Socialist Republics not elsewhere classified. In this Spotlight, Czechoslovakia is reported separately from the Czech Republic and Slovakia.
