The Importance of Immigrants in America

Our American journey and our success would simply not be possible without the generations of immigrants who have come to our shores from every corner of the globe (Jason Furman). Immigration is an important part of American culture. The United States as we know it is built on immigrants. Some immigrants where brought here by force like the Africans who traveled through the middle passage. Other came over the border in search of a better life like the Hispanic's. Regardless of how you came to this country, this nation would not be what it is today without the large number of immigrants that migrate here. Immigrants diversify, increase income and are skilled in special areas. The United States can only benefit from immigrants.

For example, increased immigration to the United States has increased the earnings of Americans with more than a high school degree. Between 1990 and 2004, increased immigration was correlated with increasing earnings of Americans by 0.7 percent and is expected to contribute to an increase of 1.8 percent over the long-term, according to a study by the University of California at Davis (Jason Furman).

Five percent, that is how much immigrants contribute to the United States economy. The little things count the most, if the little things that keep America and Americans going. Immigrants usually work those little jobs that must be done. Many immigrants work in the fields, picking fruit, vegetables and cotton. These are minimum wage jobs that many Americans refuse to work. The immigrants that do come in and do these jobs work hard without a large monetary reward.

Furthermore, besides working minimum wage jobs immigrants are very skilled and intelligent. Making up 25 percent of doctors in the United States, ranging from Africa, the Middle East and India those doctors have found cures for Illness and have saved thousands of lives. Two hundred thousand doctors are currently working in the United States. Only 500,000 of doctors working in America are American born. Immigrants are also engineers, scientist and innovators (Jason Furman). According to the Census Bureau, despite making up only 16 percent of the resident population holding a bachelor's degree or higher, immigrants represent 33 percent of engineers, 27 percent of mathematicians, statisticians, and computer scientist, and 24 percent of physical scientists. (Jason Furman).

Google, eBay and Intel are a few companies that success has come from the innovating minds of immigrants. Immigrants have started 25 percent of public U.S. companies that were backed by venture capital investors. (Jason Furman)

Additionally, America has been known as a melting pot because of the different races and religious that is able to co-exist peacefully. Immigrants help diversify; it brings different religious views, traditions and cultures. Some think that the large amount of immigrants keep Americans from uniting because of the constant amount of new religions and traditions that