Quiz on Immigration to the United States

1. What percent of the world’s immigrants come to the United States?
A. over 35%   B. 22%   C. 10%   D. less than 2%

2. From which country do the largest number of documented immigrants come to the United States?
A. People’s Republic of China   C. Mexico  B. Philippines   D. India

3. From 1870 to 1920, immigrants made up about 15% of the total US population. In 1999, what percent of the US population was born outside the United States?
A. More than 50%   C. 9.7%   B. 22.5%   D. 1.2%

4. True or False? More undocumented immigrants enter the United States by crossing the US-Mexico border than through any other means.

5. INS enforcement efforts to deter immigration at the US-Mexico border and at other checkpoints have:
A. Spent over a billion dollars on military and law enforcement at the border
B. Resulted in the death of at least 1,450 migrants since 1993
C. Employed more than 9,000 border patrol agents, more than double the number of agents in 1993

6. Immigrants come to the United States for many reasons. Order, from the greatest number of immigrants to the least number of immigrants, the reasons that people are legally admitted to the United States:
A. People who come to be reunited with other family members
B. People who come to invest in the United States
C. People who come to escape persecution
D. People who come for economic or employment reasons

7. Which international treaties has the United States signed?
A. United Nations Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women
B. United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child
C. United Nations Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination
D. United Nations Convention on the Protection of the Rights of All Migrant
Workers and Members of their Families

8. What percent of immigrants to the United States are women?
A. 31.2%  B. 45.5%  C. 53.5%  D. 62.7%

Answers:
1. D. Of the over 125 million people in the world who live outside of their countries of origin as immigrants or temporary migrants, less than 2% of these migrants come to the United States. (Migration World, 2000 and INS Annual Report, 1999)

2. C. Mexico sent the largest number of documented immigrants to the United States in 1998, with 131,575 immigrants. China sent 36,884, followed by India and the Philippines. (INS Annual Report, 1999)

3. C. In 1999, 26.4 million foreign born people resided in the United States, representing 10.4% of the population. The present percentage of immigrants in the United States is lower than in other periods. From 1870-1920, predominantly European immigrants made up 15% of the US population. (US Census Bureau, 2000, and Poverty and Race, March/April 1995)

4. False. About 60% of all undocumented immigrants enter the country legally and then overstay their visas. Only four out of ten undocumented migrants cross the Southern border, but 85% of all border enforcement personnel is located on that border. (Michael
Fix and Jeffrey Passel, "Immigration and Immigrants: Setting the Record Straight," 1994)

5. B, and C. The INS budget for its activities on the US-Mexico border was increased by 59.2 million dollars in 1999 to employ over 9,000 INS agents. In 1993, less than 4,500 agents policed the US-Mexico border. Surveillance and enforcement technology from the military are used along the border. Over 1,450 migrants have died along the border as INS strategies have pushed immigrants to cross in some of the most remote and dangerous areas of the United States. (INS, 1999, and Operation Gatekeeper, 2000)

6. A, D, C, B. In 1998, 72% of immigrants came to the United States came for family reunification. The second largest group included immigrants admitted for economic and employment reasons, at almost 12%. Approximately 8% of all immigrants came as refugees and asylum seekers, and .1% of all immigrants came as investors to the United States. (INS Annual Report, 1999)

7. C. The United States has yet to ratify a number of treaties that aim to prevent and prohibit abuses against especially vulnerable populations. They have yet to pass the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women (adopted by the UN in 1979), the Convention on the Rights of the Child (1989), and the Convention on the Protection of the Rights of All Migrant Workers and Members of their Families (1990). The US only recently ratified the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination in 1994, which had been adopted by the UN in 1969. (Human Rights Here and Now, 1998)

8. C. Slightly more than half of all immigrants to the United States are women, following a pattern established in the past few years.