Immigrating to the U.S. Is The Main Way To Escape Poverty in Dozens of Countries

David J. BierImmigrating to the United States is the main way to escape poverty in many countries. For about 3  dozen countries, most of their not‐​in‐​poverty population lives in the United States. Indeed, under the developed world poverty standard of $30 per day, immigration is just about the only way to escape poverty for several nationalities. Since poverty is practically assured in their home c ountries, it should not surprise lawmakers that millions of people would risk everything to immigrate to the United States.In 2019, only about 16 percent of people in the United Stateslived below the $30‐​per‐​day poverty line. This is somewhat higher than the13 ‐​percent rateunder the U.S. national standard (which is calculated somewhat differently). But for most countries, the poverty rates under the $30 ‐​per‐​day standardare well above 90 percent. The rates of what we in the developed world would call poverty are so high that the World Bank uses much lower thresholds to measure poverty rates in the developing world (for “extreme” poverty, about $2 per day).Usingdata from the Census Bureau ’s American Community Survey andfrom the World Bank tells us that a  majority of the not‐​in‐​poverty populations born in about 40 countries live in the United States. Figure 1 graphs the 40 countries with the highest proportion of their not‐​in‐​poverty population in the United States. Nearly all Somalis—97.7 percent—who have escaped ...

Source: Cato-at-liberty - February 21, 2023 Category: American Health Authors: David J. Bier Source Type: blogs