More migrants arriving in US from 2011 onwards have bachelor’s degrees, says study

Almost one in two immigrants arriving in the United States have bachelor’s degrees, showing a steady rise educational qualifications, said a study of US Census data by the Migration Policy Institute, a Washington-based unbiased think tank.

Released on 1 June, the report said that because most immigrants came from countries such as China, India and the Philippines, 48 percent of the arrivals between 2011 and 2015 had a bachelor's degree as against 27 percent in the five years from 1990.

Jeanne Batalova, the institute's senior policy analyst, is quoted by Reuters as saying that higher investment in education worldwide, changing outlooks about education and gender and decreased poverty were followed by the increase in education levels of immigrants.

She said that the number of illegal immigrants having degrees was also increasing. The Pew Research Center said that the number of illegal immigrants in 2015 declined below 2009 levels.

Batalova said that this goes against the long-held perception that immigrants had lower educational levels, were not high-skilled and Migrated to the US to exploit opportunities and benefits.

The study showed that educational levels of all adult immigrants having college degrees to America rose to 30 percent in 2015, an increase from 20 percent in 1990.

Among immigrants arriving from Asian nations, 62 percent of those who came recently had college degrees when compared with 40 percent and 23 percent from Africa and Latin America, respectively.

Indian immigrants had the highest educational levels as 86 percent of them had bachelor’s degrees, the report said.

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