Immigration to the United States is the international movement of individuals who are not natives or do not possess citizenship in order to settle, reside, study, or work in the country. Immigration has been a major source of population growth and cultural change throughout much of United States history. All Americans, except for Native Americans, can trace their ancestry to immigrants from other nations around the world.
In absolute numbers, the United States has a larger immigrant population than any other country, with 47 million immigrants as of 2015.[1] This represents 19.1% of the 244 million international migrants worldwide, and 14.4% of the United States population. Some other countries have larger proportions of immigrants, such as Australia with 30%[2] and Canada with 21.9%.[3]
According to the 2016 Yearbook of Immigration Statistics, the United States admitted a total of 1.18 million legal immigrants (618k new arrivals, 565k status adjustments) in 2016
.[4] Of these, 48% were the immediate relatives of United States citizens, 20% were family-sponsored, 13% were refugees or asylum seekers, 12% were employment-based preferences, 4.2% were part of the Diversity Immigrant Visa program, 1.4% were victims of a crime (U1) or their family members were (U2 to U5),
[5] and 1.0% who were granted the Special Immigrant Visa (SIV) for Iraqis and Afghans employed by the United States Government.[4] The remaining 0.4% included small numbers from several other categories, including 0.2% who were granted suspension of deportation as an immediate relative of a citizen (Z13)
;[6] persons admitted under the Nicaraguan and Central American Relief Act; children born after the issuance of a parent’s visa; and certain parolees from the former Soviet Union, Cambodia, Laos, and Vietnam who were denied refugee status.[4]
The economic, social, and political aspects of immigration have caused controversy regarding such issues as maintaining ethnic homogeneity, workers for employers versus jobs for non-immigrants, settlement patterns, impact on upward social mobility, crime, and voting behavior.