In 2024, foreign-born workers made up nearly one in five (20%) U.S. employees. That’s roughly 32 million people from a total workforce of 161.1 million.
That marks a significant shift: in 2010, the figure was just 15.6%. According to the United States Census Bureau, 26.2 million hold full-time positions, compared to 4.6 million part-time workers, with 1.3 million currently seeking roles.
Yet, contrary to stereotypes, immigrant workers cover a wide range of U.S. roles in huge numbers. Far from being concentrated in sectors like construction and the leisure industry, immigrants also enjoy particularly strong representation in the likes of education, healthcare, and professional services.
In this study, we’ll consider where immigrants are working in America, the numbers involved, and regional differences. To start, let’s look at the five industries most commonly associated with immigrant labor.
The Five Industries Commonly Associated With Immigrant Workers
When most Americans picture immigrant workers, they picture a familiar set of roles, and the data confirms that perception isn’t entirely unfounded.
Immigrant labor has long been the backbone of America’s home-building workforce, and 2024 was no exception. In 2024, construction led all ‘expected’ immigrant employment sectors with approximately 3.5 million first–generation immigrant workers. That’s roughly 10,987 for every 100,000 immigrants in the labor force, nearly one in nine foreign–born workers employed in the U.S.
Manufacturing followed closely with 3.1 million first–generation workers. That works out at 9,725 per 100,000 immigrants, a figure that underscores the enduring reliance on foreign-born labor to power assembly lines, processing plants, and production facilities.
Leisure and hospitality ranked third at just over 3 million workers, or 9,441 per 100,000. This sector has long depended on foreign-born labor to fill roles in everything from hotel housekeeping to restaurant kitchen staff, particularly in major tourist destinations and urban centers.
The sector’s dependence on immigrant labor became starkly apparent during the pandemic, when widespread labor shortages exposed the indispensable role of foreign-born leisure and hospitality workers.
Transportation and utilities followed at 2.4 million workers, 7,632 per 100,000 immigrants. This industry is increasingly dependent on foreign-born drivers, logistics workers, and utility crews.
Rounding out the list, agriculture, forestry, fishing, and hunting employed approximately 490,600 first–generation immigrant workers in 2024, or 1,533 per 100,000.
From seasonal harvesting to crop production and food supply chain roles, the agricultural industry’s dependence on immigrant labor is perhaps the most well-documented of any sector.
Taken together, these five industries account for millions of first–generation immigrant workers; they also represent the stereotypical public narrative around immigrant employment in the United States. But as the data also reveals, they tell only part of the story.
The Bureau of Labor Statistics projects that healthcare support occupations alone will need an extra 275,000 workers by 2033, and if current trends hold, first-generation immigrant workers will be expected to fill a significant share of those roles. And immigrant workers are already a huge part of the equation.
The (Perhaps Surprising) Industries Featuring Millions Of Immigrant Workers
While the public conversation around immigrant labor tends to center on construction sites and factory floors, the data tells a broader, more surprising story.
By 2024 data, the educational and health services industry was the single largest employer of first-generation immigrants and relied on 5.6 million workers, equivalent to an extraordinary 17,373 per every 100,000 immigrants in the labor force.
That means that for every 100,000 foreign-born workers in the United States, more than 17,000 earn their wages in classrooms, hospitals, clinics, and care facilities.
Professional and business services followed with 4.7 million first-generation workers. 14,767 per 100,000 immigrants is a figure that challenges a persistent misconception about immigrant labor: that it’s primarily low-skill and low-wage.
The professional and business sector features some of the most high-value, knowledge-intensive roles in the American economy: lawyers, accountants, management consultants, engineers, and corporate strategists.
Financial activities came in third at 1.6 million workers, 4,973 per 100,000 immigrants. This is another sector that rarely enters the conversation when immigration and labor are discussed, yet it’s one in which foreign-born workers are a key factor.
From banking and insurance to investment management and real estate, immigrant workers contribute to the financial infrastructure that underpins the entire U.S. economy, often in roles that require advanced education, specialized expertise, and years of professional experience.
Public administration, with 814,300 first–generation immigrant workers (2,544 per 100,000), may be the most surprising entry on this list.
The idea of immigrant workers serving in government roles, public agencies, and administrative capacities contradicts many immigrant-centric assumptions. Yet the data is unambiguous: foreign-born workers are a crucial component of the American government.
Rounding out the list, the information sector employed approximately 400,200 first–generation immigrant workers in 2024, or 1,250 per 100,000, reflecting the significant role foreign-born talent plays in America’s technology, media, and communications industries.
From software development and data science to broadcasting and digital media, immigrant workers help to drive the U.S. innovation economy.
Let’s now combine both sets of immigrant worker lists and dig deeper to look at specific roles within sectors.
The Full Spectrum Of Immigrant Occupations
A comprehensive look at immigrant occupations in 2024 reveals a workforce that defies easy categorization and dismantles stereotypes.
At the top of the list, management, business, and financial occupations employed 4.15 million first-generation immigrant workers in 2024, equivalent to 12,965 per every 100,000 immigrants in the labor force. And the fact that this category, which encompasses executives, financial analysts, accountants, and corporate managers, ranks above construction, transportation, and other traditionally immigrant-associated industries is perhaps the most striking finding in the data.
Construction and extraction was in second spot on the list with 2.99 million first-generation workers, 9,369 per 100,000, with transportation and material moving employing 2.91 million immigrant workers, or 9,091 per 100,000.
Computer, engineering, and science occupations employed 2.84 million first-generation immigrant workers in 2024, 8,866 per 100,000, confirming the significant role foreign-born talent plays in driving America’s technology and innovation economy.
From software engineers and data scientists to aerospace engineers and biomedical researchers, immigrant workers are embedded at the highest levels of the knowledge economy, filling roles that require years of advanced education and specialized expertise.
The long-term trajectory makes the picture even more striking: immigrants as a share of doctorate holders in the U.S. labor force climbed from 16.4% in 1994 to 25.8% in 2024.
And, in computer and mathematical occupations alone (the second-fastest growing field in the U.S. economy according to Bureau of Labor Statistics projections), 27% of current workers are foreign-born. The U.S. economic future is in no small part dependent on maintaining strong technological leadership. As such, the data makes it clear: American technology is heavily reliant on immigrant workers.
Education, legal, community service, arts, and media occupations were also heavily represented by immigrant workers: 2.09 million, or 6,514 per 100,000 of the population. This is another category not often associated with immigrant labor, yet one in which foreign-born workers are ubiquitous.
Food preparation and serving–related occupations employed 2.04 million first-generation immigrant workers, 6,386 per 100,000. That figure will surprise few, given the long-standing visibility of immigrant workers in America’s restaurants, cafes, and food service industry.
Production occupations were filled by similar numbers (2.04 million workers, 6,382 per 100,000), reflecting the continued concentration of immigrant labor on factory floors and in manufacturing facilities.
Healthcare practitioners and technical occupations were covered by 1.57 million first-generation workers, or 4,917 per 100,000. This number emphasizes the degree to which America’s healthcare system depends on foreign-born physicians, nurses, pharmacists, and medical technicians.
Healthcare support followed with 1.3 million workers, 4,074 per 100,000. This encompasses the home health aides, nursing assistants, and medical support staff who provide vital day-to-day care to hospitals, clinics, and long-term care facilities.
Rounding out the list, farming, fishing, and forestry employed 400,700 first-generation immigrant workers in 2024, or 1,252 per 100,000.
Interestingly, Washington, D.C. (the epicenter of the immigration debate) is one of the most immigrant-dense labor markets in the country.
From federal contractors and healthcare workers to hospitality staff and business professionals, foreign-born workers are a key part of the workforce that keeps the nation’s capital running. This fact adds a striking layer of context to the policy conversations unfolding nearby.
Overall, the data makes it clear that foreign-born workers are not concentrated in a narrow band of low-wage, low-skill roles. Instead, they’re distributed across the full spectrum of the American economy. For a country that has long debated the role of immigrant workers, this study offers unequivocal, conclusive evidence.
That said, immigrant employment is not evenly spread across the United States. Here are the regional differentials.
Regional Immigrant Worker Data
Regarding the immigrant worker spread in the United States, the West led all regions with 9.7 million foreign-born workers, 24.4% of the regional labor force.
This figure reflects decades of immigration concentrated in states like California, Nevada, and Washington, where proximity to international entry points, robust technology sectors, and large agricultural industries have long attracted large numbers of foreign-born workers.
The Northeast follows closely. 6.6 million foreign-born workers account for 22.7% of the regional labor force, driven in large part by the economic pull of major metro areas like New York City, Boston, and Newark.
These cities have historically served as primary landing points for immigrant populations and continue to represent significant concentrations of immigrants in professional, financial, and healthcare roles.
The South recorded the highest raw number of foreign-born workers of any region at 12.1 million, yet features a workforce share of 19%. This figure, although currently third-lowest on the list, represents a region subject to some of the fastest growth in immigrant labor concentration over the past two decades.
States like Texas, Florida, and Georgia have emerged as major destinations for foreign-born workers drawn by booming construction markets, large-scale agricultural operations, and hospitality industries that consistently outpace the native-born labor supply.
The Midwest, by contrast, recorded just 3.8 million foreign-born workers, a regional share of only 10.7%, less than half the West’s rate and the single lowest regional figure.
That gap may soon represent a key economic vulnerability. As the Midwest continues to grapple with persistent workforce shortages in manufacturing, healthcare, and agriculture (industries that are disproportionately reliant on immigrant labor in many parts of the U.S.), the region’s comparatively low concentration of foreign-born workers raises urgent questions about long-term labor supply and economic resilience.
And in many cases, those immigrant workers so many regions are reliant upon are undervalued and underpaid.
Median Immigrant Earnings
Despite their significant presence in some of the highest-value sectors of the American economy, first-generation immigrant workers continue to face a significant earnings gap compared to their native-born counterparts. And this disparity adds an important layer of economic context.
In 2023, the median annual earnings for first-generation immigrants in full-time, year-round roles was $52,130, a figure that, while reflective of real and meaningful economic contribution, scarcely compares to the overall median average wage of $62,088 per year.
The gap is more pronounced when broken down by sex: first-generation immigrant men earned a yearly median of $56,290, while first-generation immigrant women earned just $50,040, the lowest median earnings figure across all generational and gender categories.
What makes these numbers particularly striking is the context. As this brief has documented, first-generation immigrant workers are not concentrated exclusively in low-wage, low-skill roles: they can also be found in management suites, hospital operating rooms, engineering firms, and government offices in high numbers.
The earnings data suggests that even when immigrant workers ascend to high-value occupations, a wage gap still prevails. And this fact reflects a complex interplay of factors, including educational credential recognition barriers, language proficiency, occupational licensing restrictions, and structural disadvantages that disproportionately affect workers new to the American labor market.
For journalists and policymakers alike, the earnings data offers a critical corrective to two competing, incomplete narratives. The first, that immigrant workers are an economic burden, is countered by the sheer scale of their workforce participation and economic contribution.
The second, that immigrant workers are thriving equally alongside their native-born peers, is challenged by an earnings gap that persists even as foreign-born workers demonstrate that they can successfully carry out any job at any level.
Unfortunately, while immigrant workers are clearly indispensable to the American economy, they remain comparatively undercompensated and undervalued.
The Broad (And Growing) Importance Of Immigrant Workers
The story of immigrant labor in America is one that many Americans misunderstand.
Foreign-born workers make up nearly one in five U.S. employees, with 32 million first-generation immigrants comprising 19.2% of the entire civilian labor force. And this share has climbed steadily from just 15.6% in 2010, with no sign of slowing down.
Of those 32 million workers, 26.2 million held full-time positions, a figure that underscores the depth of immigrant employment and reflects a workforce central to its livelihood.
For every 100,000 foreign–born workers in the United States, more than 17,000 earn their wages in classrooms, hospitals, clinics, and care facilities
Contrary to the dominant public narrative, the single most common occupation among first-generation immigrant workers was not construction or food service. Instead, it was management, business, and financial operations, employing 4.15 million foreign-born workers at a rate of 12,965 per every 100,000 working immigrants.
Computer, engineering, and science occupations feature 2.84 million, with nearly one in three STEM workers in the country foreign-born; education, legal, and community service occupations added another 2.09 million.
Healthcare practitioners and technical occupations employed 1.57 million first-generation workers, and healthcare support added 1.3 million more, bringing the combined foreign-born presence across both healthcare categories to nearly 2.9 million workers, a figure that speaks directly to how deeply the American health system has come to depend on immigrant labor.
At the industry level, educational and health services ranked as the single largest employer of first-generation immigrant workers at 5.6 million, equivalent to 17,373 per every 100,000 immigrants in the labor force, nearly double the rate of construction.
Professional and business services followed at 4.7 million, financial activities at 1.6 million, and public administration at 814,300, perhaps the most counterintuitive data point in the entire brief.
Even in industries typically associated with immigrant labor (construction, manufacturing, leisure and hospitality, transportation, and agriculture) the numbers confirm a structural dependence that goes deeper than public perception acknowledges.
Geographically, the West and Northeast led the country in immigrant labor concentration at 24.4% and 22.7%, respectively, while the South recorded the highest raw number of foreign-born workers of any region with 12.1 million.
The Midwest‘s 10.7% share, less than half the rate of the West, represents a quiet but growing economic vulnerability in a region heavily dependent on industries typically reliant on immigrant labor.
Despite the enormous immigrant contribution to the U.S. workforce (and the country’s economy), first-generation immigrant workers earned a median of just $52,130 annually in 2023, significantly less than their native-born counterparts.
Immigrant women fared worst of all, earning just $50,040 on average, the lowest median earnings of any group in the dataset. And the earnings gap persists even in high-value occupations.
Ultimately, the data confirms that the immigrant workforce is both indispensable and undercompensated. As staff shortages become increasingly urgent, immigrant workers will become even more key to helping the U.S. keep its industries working optimally, a fact that should, in turn, further erode already tired stereotypes.
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