Georgia

Summary Demographic State Data (and Source)
Population (2009 CB est.):	9,829,211
Population (2000 Census):	8,186,453
Foreign-Born Population (2009 FAIR est.):	920,381
Foreign-Born Population (2000 Census):	577,273
Share Foreign-Born (2009):	9.4%
Share Foreign-Born (2000):	7.1%
Naturalized U.S. Citizens (2009):	317,394
Share Naturalized (2009):	29.3%
Legal Immigrant Admission(DHS 2000-2009):	229,110
Refugee Admission(DHS 2000-2009):	22,460
Illegal Alien Population (2010 FAIR est.):	450,000
Costs of Illegal Aliens (2010 FAIR)	$2,256,100,000
Projected 2050 Population (2006 FAIR):	15,541,000

Georgia:Extended Immigration Data

STATE POPULATION

Based on the American Community Survey (ACS), the U.S. Census Bureau estimated that in July 2009 Georgia’s population had increased to 9,829,211 residents, i.e., an annual average increase of about 176,640 residents since 2000. That is a rate of increase of about 2.1 percent per year. That rate of increase, if continued, would result in the state’s population doubling to 19.6 million by 2043. The comparable national rate of change was 1.0 percent.

FOREIGN-BORN POPULATION

Based on the American Community Survey (ACS), the U.S. Census Bureau estimated that the foreign-born population of Georgia was 920,381 persons in 2009.

NET INTERNATIONAL MIGRATION (NIM)

Based on the Current Population Survey (CPS), the Census Bureau estimated that between the 2000 Census and July 2009 the state’s population increased by about 282,000 residents from net international migration (more foreign-born arriving than leaving). That was an annual average increase of about 30,320 residents, i.e., more than one-sixth (17.2%) of the total increase (not including the children born to the immigrants after their arrival in the United States).

Georgia Sources of Population Change 2000-08

FOREIGN-BORN CHANGE

The amount of change in the foreign-born population since the 2000 Census indicates an average annual rate of increase in the foreign-born population of about 36,895 people, which is more than one-fifth (20.9%) of the state’s annual average population increase. Since 2000, the foreign-born population has increased by 59.4 percent compared to a 17.1 percent increase in the native-born population. The annual rate of increase from 2000-2009 was 5.3 percent compared to a national rate of 2.4 percent.

Immigration also contributes to population growth through the children born to immigrants in this country. Nationally the share of births to the foreign-born is about double their share of the population. An 18.8 percent share of the state’s current births is large enough to account for about 26,205 births a year. Combining the increase in the foreign-born population and estimated immigrant births suggests that immigration may account for nearly 63,100 persons added to the state’s population annually, i.e., more than one-third (35.7%) of the state’s overall population increase.

The 2000 Census found that 59.7 percent of Georgia's foreign-born population had arrived in the state since 1990. This was a higher share than the national average (43.7%). The 2009 ACS data estimate that about one-fourth (23.5%) of the state’s foreign-born population had arrived since 2000. That is lower than the 31.6 percent share of new arrivals nationally.

Foreign-Born Characteristics

An indicator of the change in Georgia's immigrant population may be seen in data on the share of the population over five years of age that speaks a language other than English at home. Between 1990 and 2000 the share of non-English speakers at home in Georgia increased by more than 80 percent, from 4.8 percent to 8.8 percent. Less than half (49.8%) of those who said they spoke a language other than English at home in 2000 also said they spoke English less than very well. The share of the population speaking other than English at home in 2009, according to the ACS, had increased to 12.5 percent. Nearly three-fifths (58%) of those who said they speak other than English at home said they spoke Spanish. Among those who said they did not speak English well, the Spanish-speaking share rose to more than two-thirds (68.7%).

Between 1990 and 2000, the share of non-English speakers increased from 12.1 percent to 14.3 percent. More than one-third (37.3%) of those persons in 2000 also said they spoke English less than very well. In the 2009 ACS, the share had increased to 16.4 percent and of those 36.6 percent spoke English less than very well. Spanish speakers were 25.4 percent of those who spoke other than English at home, and 18.1 percent of those who spoke English less than very well.

Speakers of Foreign Languages (at home in Georgia in the 2000 Census)
Spanish	426,115
French	42,630
German	32,760
Vietnamese	27,670
Korean	25,815
Chinese	19,390
Gujarathi	11,135
Kru, Ibo, Yoruba	9,770
Arabic	8,555
Japanese	8,255
(Source: Census Bureau report: Language Spoken at Home for the Population 5 Years and Over, April 2004)

The chart above shows the foreign-born population increasing by 59.4 percent since 2000 and the share of that population from Latin America and the Caribbean increasing by 67.4 percent. That region’s share of the state’s immigrant population grew from 52 percent in 2000 to 54.6 percent in 2009.

NATURALIZATION

The segment of the foreign-born population that had become U.S. citizens as of 2000 (317,394 persons) was 29.3 percent -- much lower than the 40.3 percent national average. In the 2009 ACS estimates, the naturalized citizen share was 34.5 percent, and the national share was 43.7 percent.

REFUGEES

Georgia received 22,460 refugees over the most recent ten fiscal years (FY'00-'09).

Under the Office of Refugee Resettlement's (HHS/ORR) assistance funding for FY'02 $7,375,880 is available for refugee employment training and other services programs in California based on a three-year refugee settlement program covering 29,389 refugees (an average of $251 per refugee). This allocation does not include a larger share (55%) of funding programs for communities heavily affected by recent Cuban and Haitian entrants, communities with refugees whose cultural differences make assimilation especially difficult, communities impacted by federal welfare reform changes, educational support to schools with significant refugee students, and discretionary grants. ORR grants for FY’05 and FY’06 respectively were $7,336,655 and $6,947,431

LIMITED ENGLISH PROFICIENCY STUDENTS

In Georgia overall enrollment in 2008 (1,649,589) was 18.6 percent above enrollment in 1999. LEP enrollment was 194.7 percent higher than a decade earlier. The share of LEP enrollment rose from 1.8 percent to 4.4 percent

ILLEGAL ALIENS

FAIR Estimate - FAIR estimates the state’s illegal alien population as of 2010 is as many as 450,000 persons. This is part of an overall estimate of the U.S. illegal alien population of about 12 million persons.

INS/DHS Estimate - The INS (now dissolved into the Dept. of Homeland Security) estimated that the resident illegal population in Georgia was 228,000 in 2000. This number was nearly 200,000 higher than the INS' 1996 estimate. The most recent estimate by DHS put the illegal population in the state at 460,000 in 2010.

Other Estimates - The Pew Hispanic Center estimated the illegal alien population of the state at 425,000 as of 2010.

COST OF ILLEGAL ALIENS

FAIR’s 2010 fiscal cost study, “The Fiscal Burden of Illegal Immigration on United States Taxpayers” estimated the following cost outlays and tax receipts:

Georgia Fiscal Costs In 2009
Due to Illegal Aliens ($M)		(Pct.)
K-12 educ.	$1,453.5	60.6%
LEP educ.	$217.8	9.1%
Medicaid	$265.5	11.1%
SCHIP	$52.0	2.2%
Justice	$194.6	8.1%
Welfare+	$77.1	3.2%
General	$138.0	5.8%
Total	$2,398.5
Tax Receipts	$142.4
Net Cost	$2,256.1

Source: “The Fiscal Burden of Illegal Immigration on United States Taxpayers,” FAIR 2010.

FOREIGN STUDENTS

The 2009/2010 annual report of the Institute of International Education (IIE) lists the number of foreign students attending post-secondary school in Georgia as 24,707. Five schools are listed as having a major concentration of these students:

Georgia Inst. Tech. - 4,030
U. Georgia-Athens - 1,843
Emory U. - 1,713
Georgia S.U.-Atlanta - 1,408
Savannah College - 1,072

Those schools represented more than two-thirds (68.4%) of the total foreign students in the state.

For information on foreign student issues see: Foreign Students in the United States

Population Projection

We projected Alabama’s population in 2050 likely would be between 15.15 million and 15.54 million depending on what happens with immigration policy. See “Projecting the U.S. Population to 2050: Four Immigration Scenarios,” FAIR 2006.

Georgia:Immigrant Admissions

Georgia Immigrant Admissions by Fiscal Year
2000	14,778
2001	19,431
2002	20,555
2003	10,805
2004	16,286
2005	31,535
2006	32,202
2007	27,353
2008	27,769
2009	28,396
Total	229,110

Recent immigrant admissions are at 1,567 percent of admissions just after adoption of the current immigration system in 1965. During the 1965-'69 period, annual admissions averaged about 1,880 immigrants. During the most recent five years, admissions averaged about 29,450 persons.

The charts below show recent immigrant admissions and the cumulative immigrant admissions data since 1965. The number of annual admissions has ranged from 1,371 in FY'66 to 32,202 in FY’06. The cumulative total of admissions to Colorado between fiscal years 1965 and 2009 was about 437,875 immigrants.

INS DATA BY NATIONALITY: FY'96 - FY'05

The table below furnishes INS data on the immigrants who have been admitted for residence in Georgia since 1996 by nationality.

The INS data are for nationals of the countries with the largest number of immigrants admitted or adjusted to legal residence each year since 1996. The absence of data means that the total number of admissions to the United States by nationals of that country was not enough to merit detailed reporting in that year.

The nationalities may change each year, so the totals in some cases will not reflect all the immigrants of that nationality who have become legal immigrants in Louisiana during this period.

The Department of Homeland Security website is has detailed data on immigrant admissions since FY’03 by year and by country. That resource has data for all source countries. (See http://www.dhs.gov/ximgtn/statistics/data/dslpr.shtm).

A dash (-) indicates that the data for that year was not published for that country in the Immigration Statistical Yearbook. * China includes Hong Kong and Taiwan. The Soviet Union includes Russia and former parts of the USSR. Yugoslavia includes Bosnia-Herzegovina, Croatia, Macedonia, Montenegro-Serbia, Slovakia and Slovenia.

The 31 nationalities above represent nearly three-quarters (73%) of all immigrant settlement and adjustment in Georgia during this ten-year period. The principal source countries for these immigrants (Mexico, Vietnam, India, China and the former Soviet Union) accounted for nearly two-fifths (38.3%) of all immigrant admissions since 1996. Immigrants from Mexico alone accounted for one-eighth (12.8%) of the total of new "green card" recipients.

Georgia : Poll Data

Rasmussen Poll: Arizona Law SB 1070
July 2010

Suppose the new Arizona immigration law was being considered for your state. Would you favor or oppose passage of that law in your state?

The U.S. Justice Department has decided to challenge the legality of Arizona’s new immigration law in federal court. Do you agree or disagree with the decision to challenge the legality of Arizona’s new immigration law?

A Rasmussen Report poll conducted 500 Likely Voters in Georgia on November 7th-8th found:

81% oppose granting drivers’ licenses to illegal aliens.
73% say that when police officers pull someone over for a traffic violation, they should routinely check to see if that person is in the country legally.

A Carl Vinson Institute of Government Poll taken June 16 and 27, 2006 (803 adults) found that:

83% believe that immigration levels should be decreased or kept at the current level.
65% either completely or generally agree that immigrants send most of the money they make back to their home country.
64% think that most the immigrants coming to Georgia over the past few years are illegal immigrants.
64% either completely or generally agree that immigrants receive too much government assistance.

An Atlanta Journal-Constitution poll of 501 likely voters reported on January 9, 2006 found that:

78% of Georgian likely voters say it is “important” that the state legislature restrict state services to illegal aliens.
80% would support a proposal to punish the employers of illegal immigrants
70% would support a federal proposal to create a guestworker program that allowed illegal immigrants to become legal workers.

Georgia : Immigration Impact

Environmental and Quality of Life Profile

Water: Georgia has per-capita water demand of nearly 153 gallons each day.¹ If population projections hold true, by 2050 this will have created the additional consumption of over 943 million gallons of water each day. As the state has faced dry times in recent years, Georgia has been forced to question if they will always be able to supply water to their burgeoning population. The taps may run out, when dry times inevitably strike again in the future.

Georgia's primary drinking water source comes from Lake Lanier, a manmade lake that has dipped more than twenty feet below its full level in the last year.² In fact, Lanier entered uncharted territory, hitting in 2008 its lowest, documented springtime level.³

Recognizing the limits to its own water resources, Georgia has been forced to begin looking elsewhere for water. Georgia recently lost a legal battle against Alabama and Florida, who also rely on Lake Lanier water. The case denied Georgia the right to take an additional allocation of water to divert to Atlanta, where population growth and urban sprawl are most notably rampant.⁴ In the wake of this case, Georgia opened a new court battle with neighbor Tennessee, seeking to pump water from the Tennessee River which runs between the two states borders. Beginning to face the reality of a limit on its own natural resources, Georgia is determined to try to find water downstream.⁵

Additionally, Georgia's water shortages pose serious economic threats. Such shortages create sudden depressions in tourism, home prices, and job markets such as gardening and lawn care.⁶

Although Georgia recently declared that citizens should attempt to restrict metropolitan water usage by 10 percent, and limit the number of times individual's can water their lawns in certain areas, these precautions may not be enough—especially if the state's population continues to boom.⁷

Traffic: Traffic on the state's highways increased by 48 percent from 1990 to 2008. Over half (56%) of Georgia's major urban highways are considered congested by The Road Information Project (TRIP).⁸ As population growth put more traffic on the roads, the average commute for Georgia residents increased 22 percent during the 1990s, to 28 minutes in 2000.⁹

Atlanta is America's third-most congested city in terms of time and fuel wasted, only behind Washington, DC and Los Angeles, CA. The average commuter lost 57 hours and burned 40 gallons of fuel sitting in traffic, resulting in a total cost of $3.0 billion.¹⁰ About 18 percent of commuters had a commute of 45 minutes or longer in 2008, placing Georgia sixth among states.¹¹

The Atlanta area is planning to spend $50 billion on transportation improvements over the next 25 years, only to see gridlock get worse. After expanding highways, transit and bike paths and so on, the Atlanta Regional Commission predicts that traffic delays will be increased. The drive from Marietta to Hartsfield-Jackson Airport takes 48 minutes today. In 2030 it will take 70 minutes but if Atlanta doesn't spend the money, it will take 84 minutes. In the next 25 years 2 million more people will be are expected to pour into the region.¹²

The number of miles driven each day on metro Atlanta roads is expected to rise by about 42 million miles by 2025 — about half the distance from the Earth to the sun.¹³ Carl Patton, vice chairman for transportation of the Metro Atlanta Chamber of Commerce, predicts that by 2010 Atlantans will spend more time in traffic than at home. Traffic on I-95 at is increasing by seven percent annually.¹⁴

Disappearing open space: The amount of developed land in Delaware increased by 121,400 acres from 1982 to 2007, growing at a pace of 6,570 acres per year over the last ten years of that period.¹⁵ Of the 74,542 acres of state parkland in Georgia, 8,212 are endangered by sprawl, commercial and residential development, and traffic, according to the National Park Trust.¹⁶ About two-thirds of the trees in the Atlanta area have been cut down by development, reports the Georgia Conservancy.¹⁷

A study of urban sprawl between 1970 and 1990 that calculated the impact of population increase and per capita land use found that 701.7 square miles of additional land were consumed by urban sprawl in the Atlanta metropolitan area, and 63.5 percent of that sprawl was attributable to population increase. In the Chattanooga metro area, which crosses into Georgia, sprawl consumed an additional 140 square miles and population increase accounted for 36 percent of the increase.¹⁸

Crowded Housing: An estimated 79,192 of Georgia's housing units were classified as crowded in 2008, defined as units with more than one occupant per room. This amounted to 2.3 percent of the state's housing units. 18,763 of those were severely crowded, with at least 1.5 occupants per room.¹⁹ Out of the 100 most crowded metropolitan areas with populations over 65,000 in 2008, five are in Georgia: Dalton (#25), Gainesville (#53), Rome (#75), Macon (#82), and Warner Robbins (#87).²⁰ Nationally, crowded housing rates are driven upward by immigration, where 27 percent of children in immigrant families live in crowded housing compared to 9 percent of children with native-born parents. In Georgia, the shares are 22 percent of children in immigrant families are in crowded housing compared to 9 percent of those in native-headed households.²¹

In Gwinnett County, complaints about neighborhood traffic and trash have led to zoning ordinances to limit the number of people living in single-family homes. Officials say the influx of immigrants has led to a rise in crowded housing and subsequent complaints from long-time residents.²²

Sprawl: In 1990, metro Atlanta measured about 65 miles from north to south. It's now about 110 miles across. By 2018, its range is expected to include suburbs like Athens and Dalton. The Atlanta Regional Commission projects that the region will grow by 1.6 million people by 2020.²³

Air Polution: More than 3.2 million Georgia residents live in areas where ozone pollution and smog have made it unsafe to breathe the air.²⁴ Metro Atlanta is among the worst violators of the federal standards for ground-level ozone, with dangerously high ozone levels. Most of the problem is caused by motor vehicle emissions.

The American Lung Association ranks metro Atlanta, Fulton, Rockdale, Douglas, DeKalb, and Fayette as having some of the worst air pollution in the country.²⁵ Of the 21 Georgia counties that were graded on ozone levels in the Association's 2010 assessment, 17 received an "F." Two others received a "D," and Chatham and Glynn counties were graded "B."²⁶

Solid Waste: Georgia generates 1.3 tons of solid waste per capita each year.²⁷

School Overcrowding: Georgia's K-12 enrollment increased by over 175,000 students between 2000 and 2006 (a 12 percent increase) and is projected to increase by an additional 13 percent by 2015.²⁸ Georgia has a student-teacher ratio of 14.7.²⁹

Throughout the state, schools are struggling to meet the needs of growing student populations. In many counties, students must attend classes in portable classrooms and eat lunch as early as 10:30 to ease the strain on crowded cafeterias.³⁰ In some areas, sports leagues can't find room for all the students who want to participate. Principals report that they don't have the space to comply with a recent law requiring schools to cut class sizes; more than 14,900 new classrooms are needed.

Poverty: Georgia's immigrants are more likely to be poor than their native-born counterparts. In 2007, 16.1 percent of foreign-born households were below the poverty line, compared to 14.1 percent of native households. An additional 14.1 percent of the foreign-born and 9.0 percent of native households were not in poverty but had incomes less than 1.5 times the poverty level.³¹ 21.4 percent of children in immigrant families were poor in 2006, compared to 19.4 percent of native children. ³²

Endnotes:

U.S. Geological Survey, 2000.
Garry Boulard. "Hot Water." State Legislatures Vol. 34, Issue 3, 21-23. March 2008.
Debbie Gilbert. "Our lake in crisis: What a difference a year makes." Gainesville Times. May 25, 2008.
Joe Cook. "Georgia officials take wrong tack on water." Journal-Constitution. April 22, 2008.
Joe Cook. "Georgia officials take wrong tack on water." Journal-Constitution. April 22, 2008
Richard Sammon. "Water Shortages: Atlanta's Cup Nearly Runneth Out." Kiplinger Business Forecasts Vol 2007, No 1221. December 21, 2007.
Richard Sammon. "Water Shortages: Atlanta's Cup Nearly Runneth Out." Kiplinger Business Forecasts Vol 2007, No 1221. December 21, 2007
The Road Information Project (TRIP), "Key Facts about Georgia's Surface Transportation System and Federal Funding," May 2010.
"The 2005 Urban Mobility Report", Texas Transportation Institute. "U.S. Population 2007 Data Sheet," Population Reference Bureau.
Texas Transportation Institute, "Urban Mobility Report 2009."
American Community Survey, 2008 Estimates, Custom Data Table.
Jingle Davis, "It's No Longer Just the Seashore Islands that Attract Development: Growth Moves Inland," Atlanta Journal-Constitution, August 28, 2000.
Dave Williams, "Barnes' Green-Space Plan Covers Most of State," Savannah Morning News, February 2, 2000
Jane Gross, "Urban Sprawl Threatens the Solitude and Fragile Lands of Georgia's State Parks," New York Times, August 31, 2000.
USDA Natural Resources Conservation Service, "Summary Report: 2007 National Resources Inventory."
Lee Bey, "Nation's New Suburbia Growing Out of Control," Chicago Sun-Times, November 19, 2000.
Haya El Nasser, "U.S. Neighborhoods Grow More Crowded," USA Today, July 7, 2002.
Randy Capps, "Hardship among Children of Immigrants: Finding from the 1999 National Survey of America's Families," Urban Institute, 2001.
American Community Survey, Three-Year Estimates 2006-2008. Data retrieved using ACS Custom Table tool.
American Community Survey, 2008 Estimates. Data retrieved using ACS Custom Table tool.
Kids Count Data Center, which used 2008 American Community Survey Data.
R. Costello, "Centennial Place: Model of Mixed-Use Urban Living," Atlanta Business Chronicle, September 7, 1998.
Michael Kanell, "Atlanta's Explosive Growth Comes at a Steep Price," Atlanta Journal Constitution, June 30, 2002.
"State of the Air 2005: Georgia", American Lung Association.
Ibid.
American Lung Association, "State of the Air 2010."
Report Card for America's Infrastructure 2005," American Society of Civil Engineers.
"Overview of Public Elementary and Secondary Schools and Districts: School Year 1999-2000," National Center for Education Statistics, U.S. Department of Education. "Projections of Education Statistics to 2015," National Center for Education Statistics, U.S. Department of Education. "Public Elementary and Secondary School Student Enrollment, High School Completions, and Staff From the Common Core of Data: School Year 2005-06', National Center for Education Statistics, U.S. Department of Education, June 2007.
"Public Elementary and Secondary School Student Enrollment, High School Completions, and Staff From the Common Core of Data: School Year 2005-06', National Center for Education Statistics, U.S. Department of Education, June 2007.
"Shannon Womble, "No Room to Grow," Savannah Morning News, August 24, 2000.
Migration Information Source State Data (Migration Policy Institute)
Urban Institute, Children of Immigrants Data Tool.

Other Resources

State Local Reform Organizations

State Representatives Voting Record

Updated December 2011

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