Today, more than 40 million people who live in the United States are immigrants from different part of the world. The United States is the country which leads in accepting foreigners to com, stay and work in the United States forever. This has managed to attract different people with different skills and experience in various field. The United States with a population of 280 million, the immigrants make about 14.7% of the population. These figures cannot be ignored and therefore, the immigrants affect the business community and the U.S. economy. Whether illegal or legal immigrants, immigrants offer labor to business and households, pay taxes, create employments, and also a big part of consumers which every business need. And therefore, immigrants contribute immensely to the development of business and the economy of the United States.
Research has indicated that immigrants have contributed to the growth of the United States economy contrary to belief that immigrants take Americans job (Lindsay 5). According to Lindsay (15), immigrants offer labor to various industries from medicine, nursing, IT, Engineering, and other fields. They fill the void in the job market making the United States to have a continuous and stand workforce than any other countries in the world. Studies have indicated that more than 40% of nursing practitioners in the United States are immigrants and 60% of the people working in low level employment such as cleaners, and other households’ jobs and therefore, immigrants provide essential labor to the United States (Lindsay 10). Without immigrants the U.S. would have been suffering from lack labor force in the industrial and farming sectors since majority of employees in the sectors are foreigners.
Immigrants have always been the greatest assets to the United States economy. Despite being immigrants, they pay tax which contributes a lot to the U.S. growth domestic product (GDP). Several studies have shown that immigrants contributes billions of dollars in terms of tax to the U.S. economy and therefore, immigrants contribution and effect to the United States economy is not minimal as some might thing. Research has established that in 2013, immigrants added a total of 1.3 trillion dollars to the U.S. economy and therefore, the contribution of immigrants to the economy of the United States is not minimal (Estrada 23). However, the contribution of immigrants would be more significant if the Congress would support a bill which create pathway to citizenry which would allow immigrants to work without getting worried of being deported.
Immigrants’ importance to business community
Immigrants have contributed significant to the growth of business community in the United States. Research has established that some of the greatest business leaders in the United States are daughters, sons of immigrants or immigrants themselves. The founder of Google Sergey Brin is an immigrant who fled from Soviet Union more than forty years ago to start a life in the United States. The founder of Yahoo Jerry Yang is also an immigrant from Taiwan, the CEO of Microsoft an immigrant from India and so many others who are playing the greatest role in shaping the business empire of the United States. In fact, studies have indicated that more 40% of the Fortune 500 is daughters, sons of immigrants of immigrants themselves. Studies have shown than companies such as McDonald, Bank of African, AT&T, Apple and General Electrons and Google are some of the companies founded by either immigrants or daughter or sons of immigrants. Research has shown than these companies founded by immigrants contribute more than 1.7 trillion dollars to the government which boast the countries’ GDP (Estrada 12).
The business owned by immigrants offer approximately 3.6 million jobs to the United States economy and therefore, these businesses contribute a huge employment avenue to American population. It is therefore, importance to note that immigrants do not just consume the jobs but over workforce opportunity as well. Besides making a bigger contribution in big business ventures and innovation, immigrants are also making a greater contribution in small business across the United States. There are thousands of immigrants who run a small business enterprise in different states and these people pay levy, employ other people and therefore, the contribution of immigrants in the business community in the United States is very huge and it impacts the United States economy directly.
Interestedly, statistic also indicates that the chance of immigrants starting their own business is higher compared to the Native America. The Study by Small Business Administration shows that 10.5 % of immigrants are likely to start their own businesses compared to 9.3% of the Native American (Amadeo 5). This is a positive trend and it can mean that the immigrants will continue to play an essential role on the American economy over the next decades. The immigrants’ contribution in economy directly through paying for taxes, offering employment opportunities to different people both immigrants and the Native Americas. And therefore, immigrants are importance to the growth of the United States economy.
Labor Force
Though some people have argued that immigrants take the American jobs and therefore, immigrants should be barred from coming into the United States. It is not true because most jobs taken by immigrants are jobs Americans have left and Americans are coming in to fill the void. A study has shown that immigrants contribute greatly to the labor market than indigenous Americans. The report shows that immigrants work in the farms, industries, households and other sector of the economy and they play a significant role in the growth of the economy. A study has indicated that the number of immigrants who are participating in the United States’ economic growth through labor force is slightly higher than the native people. It has been established that 73.4% of workforce are immigrants while 71.1 of the natives contribute to the workforce of the United States and going by the population of immigrants and native in the United States then it can means that the largest percentage of immigrants population contributes to the workforce in the United States compared to the native population.
Figure 1: Percentage of people in the job market
Research has shown that immigrants contribute immensely to the job market but when it comes to pay native earn slightly higher than immigrant worker. The wage gap is not the same and therefore, the notion that immigrants are taking native jobs is untrue. However, the immigrants in the United States make a bigger contribution to the growth of American economy through labor force contribution, and because no economy can grow without sufficient labor force.
According to Lindsay (12), the immigration of highly skilled people to the United States help the gap to bridge the work gap. This is because these skilled immigrants are likely to come up with innovation which is more likely to create job opportunities to the American people. And therefore, immigrants have the potential to change the economic growth of the United States if given good opportunities through laws which prevent harassment of immigrants so that they work and grow the U.S. economy together (Estrada 23).
Analysis
The rate at which immigrants’ starts business in the United States is higher compared to the Native American. Research has shown a significant improvement on the number of immigrants in business compared to the local. This means that in the next years, the immigrants will be the key drivers of the United States’ economy. Currently approximately 1.7 trillion dollars are contributed to the United States economy through tax and other levies by companies started by immigrants’ daughter, son or an immigrant. A study has shown that in every 1000 immigrants, it is more likely that 62 of them would start a business and manage it successfully. The business run or managed by immigrants have also grown steadily over the year and become stable hence contributing towards bridging the wage gap and to the GDP growth of the United States. The graph below hence explain business concept and success rate of business started by immigrants and business started by the Native Americans.
Figure 2: Companies Started by immigrants
In conclusion, an immigrant contributes immensely to the growth of the United States economy and the business community as well. It has been discovered that immigrants working pays over 1.3 trillion to the government in terms of taxes and other levies. This is a huge contribution to the GDP of the country which cannot be taken for granted and therefore, the United States economy needs immigrants to keep the economic growth stable. Studies have also established that immigrants’ business contribute to the work force and have employed over 3.6 million American working in different sectors and therefore, immigrants contribution to the United States’ economy and business community is enormous. It has been discovered that immigrants provide labor force in various sectors of the economy and some of the sectors are the importance sectors of the economy and therefore, it is a fact that immigrants’ contribution to the U.S. economy and the business community is enormous. And therefore, immigrants should be given opportunity to settle in the United States.
Works Cited
Amadeo, Kimberly. “How Immigration Affects the Economy and You: Pros and Cons of immigration.” https://www.thebalance.com/how-immigration-impacts-the-economy-4125413 (2018): 2-25.
Estrada, Cesar Maximiliano. “How Immigrants Positively Affect the Business Community and the U.S. Economy.” Center For American Progress (2016): 1-35.
Lindsay, Rowena. “How immigration helps the US economy: Report.” the Chritian Scene Monitor (2017): 2-37.
