Immigration and the States Project

States are taking an increasingly active role in immigration-related policy. One issue several have addressed in recent years is whether to issue driver’s licenses to foreign-born residents who are not authorized to be in the United States.

The employment patterns of immigrants differ from those of U.S.-born workers across industries and states. This interactive captures the variation by measuring the employment distribution ratio, which compares the likelihood that an immigrant worker is employed in each of 13 industries with that of an U.S.-born worker in each of the 50 states and the District of Columbia. In Arizona, for instance, the employment distribution ratio for the administrative services industry is 2.0, meaning that immigrants are twice as likely as U.S.-born individuals to hold a job in this sector.

This report will help states and localities prepare for their potential roles in implementing any future federal legalization program for unauthorized immigrants. It reviews previous and ongoing immigration initiatives and identifies four key roles played by state and local governments: outreach, documentation, education and protection of immigrants from fraudulent services. The research also highlights how the growth and geographic dispersion of the unauthorized immigrant population in the United States—which historically has been concentrated in six states and is now spread across the country—means that all states may play a role in implementing a new legalization program.

This brief examines current population trends among the foreign- and native-born at the county level, and highlights the role that immigrants play in contributing to population growth and slowing population loss.