The overview of our project
As is well known
the history of the United States of America traces back its roots to 1492 year
when the first European reached the bans of a new continent, today known as
North America. From that time on begun the flows of immigrants to the country.
However, the most numerous immigration flows country have seen during the 20-th
century when Europe experienced several crises and consequently caused the
influx of refugees. The main goal of our
project is to analyze the
immigrants’ impact on the economic, social and political spheres in the second
half of the 20th century in New York until a terrorist attack of September 11,
2001. The objectives of the project are to touch upon main immigration acts and
immigration flows to each boroughs. Our objectives are to carefully consider
the impact of immigrants on every sphere: to assess the demographic situation,
to analyze the dependence of the crime rate rise on immigration waves, to point
out the difference between the households income of citizens and immigrants in
New York, to determine the role of immigrants in New York city's labor force,
to form a pattern of art development with the influx of immigrants. Also, the
objectives are to review and to analyze the level of educational attainment
among immigrants in New York, as well as to determine the level of poverty and
unemployment of immigrants.
On the issue of establishment of the city, we give a short historical background on formation of five
existing boroughs of New York City. At the turn of the 20th century, New York City became the city we know
today. In 1895, residents of Queens, the Bronx, Staten Island and Brooklyn,
which all were independent cities at that time, voted to merge with Manhattan
to form a five-borough “Greater New York.” As a result, on January 1, 1898,
when the merging plan took effect, New York City had an area of 360 square
miles and a population of about 3,350,000 people.
The 20th century was an era of great
struggle for New York. The construction of interstate highways and suburbs
after World War 2 encouraged affluent people to leave the city,
which combined with deindustrialization and other economic changes to lower the
tax base and diminish public services. This, in turn, led to more out-migration.
However, the Hart-Cellar Immigration and Nationality Act of 1965 made it
possible for immigrants from Asia, Africa, the Caribbean and Latin America to
come to the United States. Many of these newcomers settled in New York City, reconstructing
many neighborhoods.
The rubric about legislative impact describes how changes in immigration
law have resulted in a huge influx of non-European immigrants to the city. It
then briefly examines residential settlement patterns of immigrants, their
sociodemographic characteristics, and the impact of immigration on the city’s
population
growth, housing, and its ethnic composition. There have been two epochal periods: the 1880 to 1924
age of mass migration, primarily from southern and eastern Europe, and the
post-1965 wave of immigration, primarily from Latin America and Asia. Each of
these eras added more than 25 million immigrants. Also in 1952 was passed the
Immigration and Nationality Act which ended Asian exclusion from immigrating to
the United States and introduced a system of preferences based on skill sets
and family reunification. In other words, it raised the level of illegal
bad-qualified immigrants.
And already in 1965 Amendments to the Immigration and Nationality Act changed a lot in
ethnic composition of new immigrants. The new criteria for admission under the
1965 Act were family reunification and scarce occupational skills. The new
preference system allowed highly skilled professionals, primarily doctors,
nurses, and engineers from Asian countries to immigrate. Since the passage
of the Immigration and Nationality Act of 1965, and particularly since the
1980s, New York City has seen renewed rates of high immigration. Newer
immigrants are from Latin America, the Caribbean, Asia, Eastern Europe and
Africa. 36% of the city's population is foreign-born. Among U.S. cities, this
proportion is higher only in Los Angeles and Miami. In New York no single
country or region of origin dominates. The eleven largest countries of origin
are the Dominican Republic, China, Jamaica, Guyana, Mexico, Ecuador, Haiti,
Trinidad and Tobago, Colombia, Russia and El Salvador. Between 1990 and 2000
the city admitted 1,224,524 immigrants. Demographers and city officials have
observed that immigration to New York City has been slowing since 1997. Dominicans
were the largest foreign-born group in 2000 numbering 369,200, or nearly 13
percent of the city’s foreign-born, followed by China, Jamaica, Guyana, and
Mexico.
Another
law passed on November 2, 1966 was the Cuban Adjustment Act (CAA). The law
applies to any native or citizen of Cuba who has been inspected and admitted
into the United States after January 1, 1959 and has been physically present
for at least one year; and is admissible to the United States as a permanent
resident. For the three years that we have statistics, the success rate for
Cuban applicants is quite high. In 1996 approximately 67% of those registered
were issued visas, in 1997 the success rate was 69% and in 1998 a total of 73%
of Cuban applicants who applied for the diversity visa program were issued
visas.
The next one was the Immigration Act of 1990. It
was a national reform of the Immigration and Nationality Act of 1965. It
increased total, overall immigration to allow 700,000 immigrants to come to the
U.S. per year for the fiscal years 1992–94, and 675,000 per year after that. It
provided family-based immigration visa, created five distinct employment based
visas, categorized by occupation, and a diversity visa program that created a
lottery to admit immigrants from "low admittance" countries or
countries where their citizenry was underrepresented in the U.S.
And llegal Immigration Reform and Immigrant
Responsibility Act of 1996:
-addressed
border enforcement and the use of social services by immigrants;
-increased
the number of border patrol agents;
-introduced
new border control measures;
-reduced
government benefits available to immigrants;
-established a pilot program in which employers and
social services agencies could check by telephone or electronically to verify
the eligibility of immigrants applying for work.
In addition, New York have experienced crucial democrphic change, so in the post-1965 period immigration has helped lessen catastrophic population losses City suffered in the 1970s, stabilized the city’s population in the 1980s, and propelled the city to a new population peak of 8 million in 2000. Immigration continues to play a crucial role in the city’s population growth in the post-2000 period. Newer immigrants are from Latin America, the Caribbean, Asia, Eastern Europe and Africa. Among U.S. cities, In New York no single country or region of origin dominates. The eleven largest countries of origin are the Dominican Republic, China, Jamaica, Guyana, Mexico, Ecuador, Haiti, Trinidad and Tobago, Colombia, Russia and El Salvador.
In the rubric about economical impact is analyzed the impact of immigrants in the city's housing. As a result of population losses in the 1970s and early 1980s, housing in many neighborhoods of the city was abandoned, but most of this housing has been brought back, often due to immigrant occupancy. Indeed, imniigrant households accounted for 48 percent of all housing units occupied between 1990 and 2002. In many neighborhoods in Queens, immigrants accounted for 70 percent or more of recent occupancy. The U.S.-born children of immigrants-rhe second generation-also play a crucial role in the city’s housing market. Of all the new housing units that came on the market between 1998 and 2002, 13 percent were occupied by a second-generation householder, while 34 percent were occupied by an immigrant head.
Household income plays an equal important role in analyzing the economic sphere of life in New York City. Overall, nominal household income in New York City is characterized by large variations. This phenomenon is especially true of Manhattan, which in 1995 was home to the highest incomes U.S. census tract, with a household income of $88,697, as well as the lowest, where household income was $4,320. New York City's borough of Manhattan is the highest nominal income county in the United States. In particular, on Manhattan's Upper East Side, where live more than 100,000 inhabitants and a per capita income of over $90,000, has one of the largest concentrations of income in the United States. The other boroughs, especially Queens and Staten Island, have large middle-class populations.
New York City would be almost unrecognizable without the immigrants that have arrived in the second half of the 20th . The 400,000 housing units built since 1980, and all the construction jobs they created, would likely not exist. The city would also have had hundreds of thousands of vacant properties. While this scenario may seem far-fetched, it is not too far from the fate of other large American cities that were unable to attract many immigrants during the same period. The success of the urban experiment today depends on new infusions of talent and consumers. In a place like New York City, which opens its doors widely to immigrants, regeneration is a constant part of daily life. However, the future of New York City depends on the future of immigration in the United States. In a nation with continued and expanded authorized immigration, New York and its communities will continue to serve their social and economic function, helping immigrant families transform their lives. A decline in authorized immigration would return these communities to the conditions they faced in the mid-twentieth century, with shrinking populations and tax bases making it hard for city leaders to fulfill their promises to provide good schools, public services and economic opportunity to all the city’s residents - immigant and U.S.-born alike.
Household income plays an equal important role in analyzing the economic sphere of life in New York City. Overall, nominal household income in New York City is characterized by large variations. This phenomenon is especially true of Manhattan, which in 1995 was home to the highest incomes U.S. census tract, with a household income of $88,697, as well as the lowest, where household income was $4,320. New York City's borough of Manhattan is the highest nominal income county in the United States. In particular, on Manhattan's Upper East Side, where live more than 100,000 inhabitants and a per capita income of over $90,000, has one of the largest concentrations of income in the United States. The other boroughs, especially Queens and Staten Island, have large middle-class populations.
New York City would be almost unrecognizable without the immigrants that have arrived in the second half of the 20th . The 400,000 housing units built since 1980, and all the construction jobs they created, would likely not exist. The city would also have had hundreds of thousands of vacant properties. While this scenario may seem far-fetched, it is not too far from the fate of other large American cities that were unable to attract many immigrants during the same period. The success of the urban experiment today depends on new infusions of talent and consumers. In a place like New York City, which opens its doors widely to immigrants, regeneration is a constant part of daily life. However, the future of New York City depends on the future of immigration in the United States. In a nation with continued and expanded authorized immigration, New York and its communities will continue to serve their social and economic function, helping immigrant families transform their lives. A decline in authorized immigration would return these communities to the conditions they faced in the mid-twentieth century, with shrinking populations and tax bases making it hard for city leaders to fulfill their promises to provide good schools, public services and economic opportunity to all the city’s residents - immigant and U.S.-born alike.
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