Mexican Immigrants: How Many Come? How Many Leave?

The flow of immigrants from Mexico to the United States has declined sharply since mid-decade, but there is no evidence of an increase during this period in the number of Mexican-born migrants returning home from the U.S., according to a new analysis by the Pew Hispanic Center of government data from both countries.

The Mexican-born population in the U.S., which had been growing earlier in the decade, was 11.5 million in early 2009. That figure is not significantly different from the 11.6 million Mexican immigrants in 2008 or the 11.2 million in 2007.

The current recession has had a harsh impact on employment of Latino immigrants, raising the question of whether an increased number of Mexican-born residents are choosing to return home. This new Hispanic Center analysis finds no support for that hypothesis in government data from the United States or Mexico.

Mexico is by far the leading country of origin for U.S. immigrants, accounting for a third (32%) of all foreign-born residents and two-thirds (66%) of Hispanic immigrants. The U.S. is the destination for nearly all people who leave Mexico, and about one-in-ten people born there currently lives in the U.S.

Patterns of migration between the U.S. and Mexico are varied. Many immigrants come from Mexico to settle permanently, but large numbers also move both ways across the U.S.-Mexico border throughout the year, sometimes staying for only a few months, a pattern known as circular migration. Mexican-U.S. migration also tends to be seasonal, with larger northbound flows in the spring and summer and larger southbound flows in the fall and winter.

This report examines whether the recent annual volume of movement between the U.S. and Mexico has gone up or down in either direction. It relies on major national population surveys from Mexico and the U.S., as well as on U.S. Border Patrol apprehension figures. No single source presents the full picture of migration flows between the two countries, but the three sources examined here point to similar conclusions.

Data from population surveys taken in the U.S. and Mexico indicate that in recent years there has been a large flow of migrants back to Mexico, but the size of the annual return flow appears to be stable since 2006. Mexico’s National Survey of Employment and Occupation estimates that 433,000 Mexican migrants returned home from February 2008 to February 2009. For the same period in 2007-2008, 440,000 did, compared with an estimated 479,000 from February 2006 to February 2007.

As for immigration to the U.S. from Mexico, data from several sources attest to recent substantial decreases in the number of new arrivals.

The inflow began to diminish in mid-decade, and has continued to do so through early 2009, according to an analysis of the latest available population surveys from both countries. This finding is reinforced by data from the U.S. Border Patrol showing that apprehensions of Mexicans attempting to cross illegally into the United States decreased by a third between 2006 and 2008.

By Jeffrey Passel and D’Vera Cohn

To download report CLICK on link below:
http://pewhispanic.org/files/reports/112.pdf>

Other Resources

Mexican Immigrants in the United States. Washington DC: Pew Hispanic Center, April 2009.

Indicators of Recent Migration Flows from Mexico. Washington, DC: Pew Hispanic Center, May 2007.

U.S. Department of Homeland Security. Apprehensions by the U.S. Border Patrol: 2005-2008, June 2009.

Mexican government, Instituto Nacional de Estadística y Geografía (INEGI), Encuesta Nacional de Ocupación y Empleo (ENOE, National Survey of Occupation and Employment). Press release, June 2, 2009, “Informacion Sobre el Flujo Migratorio Internacional de Mexico.”