his brief highlights the life circumstances of young children age 0 to 8 growing up in immigrant families. 1 Immigration Trends The number of young children of immigrants has doubled since 1990; this increase accounts for the entire growth in the U.S. population of young children since 1990 Ⅲ Currently, 8.7 million U.S. children age 0 to 8 have at least one foreign-born parent, a doubling from 4.3 million in 1990. 2 By contrast, the number of children with native-born parents has declined slightly from 27.8 million in 1990 to 27.3 million in 2008. Thus, children of immigrants accounted for the entire growth in the number of young children in the United States between 1990 and 2008 (figure 1). Ⅲ Nearly one in four children (24 percent) younger than age 8 have immigrant parents. The share has steadily increased over time, rising from 13 percent in 1990 to 20 percent in 2000 and to 24 percent in 2008. Ⅲ Young children are more likely to have immigrant parents than older children. In 2008, 25 percent of children age 0-2 have immigrant parents; the share is 24 percent for children age 3-5 and 23 percent for those age 6-8. Young children of immigrants have diverse origins Ⅲ Forty-three percent of young children of immigrants age 0-8 (more than two of every five) have Mexican parents (figure 2). Looking beyond Mexican origin, however, immigrant origins are very diverse, with no more than 10 percent of children having parents from any of the other 10 broad regions of the world. Combining three regions, 20 percent have origins in the countries of Central America (8 percent), the Caribbean (7 percent), or South America (6 percent). Another 22 percent of children have parents born in Asia or the Middle East: East Asia and Pacific (or "East Asia," 9 percent), South Central Asia (5 percent), Southeast Asia (4 percent), and the Middle East (3 percent). The remaining 15 percent of children have parents born in Africa, Central and Eastern Europe (or "Central Europe"), and Western Europe, Canada, and Australia (or "Western Europe"). Ⅲ The shares of preschool-age children of African or Central American origin are likely to increase in the near
he latest Census data with information about the foreign-born population in the United States show that in the last decade children of immigrants are continuing to grow in numbers, but more slowly than during the 1990s. 1 In 2009, children of immigrants age 0 to 17 reached 16.8 million, up from 13.3 million in 2000, and double their number in 1990. The share of children with a foreign-born parent increased from 13 percent in 1990 to 23 percent, or close to one in four, in 2009. 2 Continued growth in the number of children in immigrant families during the 2000s offset the decline in children with native-born parents, contributing to the changing demographics of the child population. Between 2000 and 2009, the minority share of U.S. children under age 18 increased from 38 to 44 percent, driven by growth in the number of Hispanic and non-Hispanic Asian children and a decline in non-Hispanic white children. While the increase in minority children included children with foreign-and native-born parents, children of immigrants accounted for most of the growth. This brief highlights this and other important trends in the changing demographics of the U.S. child population nationally and across states. Children of immigrants accounted for more than half (58 percent) of the growth in the child population of 8.7 million during the 1990s (Fortuny and Chaudry 2009) and for all growth in the past decade (figure 2). Since 2000, the population of children with native-born parents declined by 1.4 million; most of the decline occurred between 2000 and 2006. The decline was offset by a 3.9 million increase in the number of native-born children of immigrants. Thus, Children of Immigrants Growing National and State Diversity Brief No. 5
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