Hawaii
| Summary Demographic State Data (and Source) | |
|---|---|
| Population (2009 CB est.): | 1,295,178 |
| Population (2000 Census): | 1,211,537 |
| Foreign-Born Population (2009 CB est.): | 224,227 |
| Foreign-Born Population (2000 Census): | 212,229 |
| Share Foreign-Born (2009): | 17.3% |
| Share Foreign-Born (2000): | 17.5% |
| Naturalized U.S. Citizens (2009 CB est.): | 129,582 |
| Share Naturalized (2009): | 57.8% |
| Legal Immigrant Admission (DHS 2000-2009): | 63,844 |
| Refugee Admission (HHS 2000-2009): | 22,460 |
| Illegal Alien Population (2010 FAIR est.): | 30,000 |
| Costs of Illegal Aliens (2010 FAIR) | $149,100,000 |
| Projected 2050 Population (2006 FAIR) | 1,802,000 |
Hawaii : Extended Immigration Data
STATE POPULATION
Using the American Community Survey (ACS), the U.S. Census Bureau estimated that in July 2009 Hawaii’s population had increased to 1,295,178 residents, i.e., an annual average increase of about 8,995 residents since 2000. That is a rate of increase of about 0.7 percent per year. The comparable national rate of change was 1.0 percent.
Hawaii had the 14th highest rate of population increase in the country between 1960-2000.
The 2000 Census found 1,211,537 persons resident in Hawaii. This was an increase of 103,308 persons (9.3%) above the 1990 Census. That was an annual rate of increase of 0.9 percent. The comparable national rate of change was 1.2 percent.
The 2000 population was about 45,000 more persons than the Census Bureau had expected to find in the state in 2000 when it issued its 1996 state population projections. The significance of this is that the Census Bureau has concluded that much of the shortfall in their population estimates during the 1990s was due to an underestimation of the illegal alien population.
Hawaii's population increased from 1980 to 1990 by slightly more than one-sixth (from 964,691 to 1,108,229). That was an annual average increase of about 1.1 percent, i.e., slightly higher than the national annual average rate of change of 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 Hawaii was 224,227 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 38,950 residents from net international migration (more foreign-born arriving than leaving). That was an annual average increase of about 4,190 residents, i.e., nearly half (46.6%) of the state’s total population increase (not including the children born to the immigrants after their arrival in the United States).
FOREIGN-BORN CHANGE
The 2000 Census recorded 212,229 foreign-born residents in the state. That was 17.5 percent of the state's overall population and an increase of 30.4 percent above the 1990 foreign-born population of 162,704 residents. That rate of increase in the immigrant population was much higher than the 5.7 percent increase in the state's native-born population, but it was lower than the national average increase in the foreign-born population of 57.4 percent. The annual rate of increase from 2000-2009 was 0.6 percent compared to a national rate of 2.4 percent.
The 2000 Census found that 34.1 percent of Hawaii's foreign-born population had arrived in the state since 1990. This demonstrates the effects of the current mass immigration, although it was a lower share than the national average (43.7%). The 2009 ACS estimate was that more than one-fourth (25.7%) of the foreign-born population had arrived since 2000.
The 2000 Census found that 25.7 percent of Florida's foreign-born population had arrived in the state since 1990. This was a lower share than the national average (43.7%). The 2009 ACS data estimate that more than one-third (34.1%) of the state’s foreign-born population had arrived since 2000. That is higher than the 31.6 percent share of new arrivals nationally.
A comparison of the increase in the immigrant population from 1990 with the change in the overall population during the same period shows that immigrant settlement directly accounted for 47.9 percent of the state's overall population increase over that decade. The share of the population increase due to immigration would be still higher if the children of the immigrants born here after their arrival were included with their immigrant parents in the calculation.
During the 1990s the state’s foreign-born population decreased by 1,068 from 171,373.
FOREIGN-BORN CHARACTERISTICS
An indicator of the change in Hawaii'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 other-than-English speakers fell from 35.8 percent to 24.9 percent. More than half (53.5%) of those persons in 2000 also said they spoke English less than very well. In the 2009 ACS, the share that spoke English less than very well had fallen to 47.6 percent. Of the other-than-English speakers in 2009, about one-sixth (16.6%) were Spanish speakers. Of those who did not speak English well, 4.3 percent were Spanish speakers.
| Speakers of Foreign Languages (at home in Hawaii in the 2000 Census) |
|
| Tagalog | 60,965 |
| Japanese | 56,225 |
| Ilocano | 45,900 |
| Chinese | 21,760 |
| Hawaiian | 19,045 |
| Spanish | 18,820 |
| Korean | 18,335 |
| Samoan | 11,530 |
| Vietnamese | 8,270 |
| Cantonese | 4,995 |
| (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 more than doubling (139%) since 2000 and the share of that population from Asia and Oceania increasing by 126 percent. That region’s share of the state’s immigrant population fell slightly from 91.7 percent to 86.7 percent in 2009.
NATURALIZATION
Data from the 2009 ACS indicate that 129,582 residents, or 57.8 percent, of the foreign-born population in Hawaii were U.S. citizens, compared to 53,278 residents, or 56.7 percent, in 2000.
Nationally, 40.3 percent of the foreign-born population had U.S. citizenship in 2000, and 43.7 percent in 2009.
REFUGEES
Hawaii received 22,460 refugees over the most recent ten fiscal years (FY'00-'09).
LIMITED ENGLISH PROFICIENCY STUDENTS
In Hawaii overall enrollment in 2008 (179,897) was 3.2 percent below enrollment in 1999. LEP enrollment was 38.7 percent higher than a decade earlier. The share of LEP enrollment rose from 6.9 percent to 9.9 percent.
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 Hawaii as 5,000. Five schools in Hawaii are listed as having a major concentration of these students:
- U. of Hawaii-Manoa – 1,746.
- Hawaii Pac. U.– 1,029
- BYU-Laia. – 973
- Kapiolani CC. – 601
- U. of Hawaii-Hilo. – 317
Those schools represented most (93.3%) of the total foreign students in the state.
For information on foreign student issues see: Foreign Students in the United States
ILLEGAL ALIENS
FAIR Estimate - FAIR estimates the state’s illegal alien population as of 2010 is as many as 30,000 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 in February 2003 that the resident illegal population in Hawaii was 2,000 as of January 2000. This number was actually 7,000 lower than the INS' 1996 estimate.
Other Estimates - The Pew Hispanic Center estimates the illegal alien population of the state at 35,000 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:
| Hawaii Fiscal Costs In 2009 | ||
| Due to Illegal Aliens ($M) | (Pct.) | |
| K-12 educ. | $70.8 | 45.7% |
| LEP educ. | $14.2 | 9.2% |
| Medicaid | $13.3 | 8.6% |
| SCHIP | $3.0 | 1.9% |
| Justice | $11.1 | 7.2% |
| Welfare+ | $15.3 | 9.9% |
| General | $27.3 | 17.6% |
| Total | $155.0 | |
| Tax Receipts | $5.9 | |
| Net Cost | $149.1 | |
Source: “The Fiscal Burden of Illegal Immigration on United States Taxpayers,” FAIR 2010.
POPULATION PROJECTION
We projected Hawaii’s population in 2050 likely would be between 1.73 million and 1.8 million depending on what happens with immigration policy. See “Projecting the U.S. Population to 2050: Four Immigration Scenarios,” FAIR 2006.
Hawaii : Immigrant Admissions
| Hawaii Immigrant Admissions by Fiscal Year |
|
| 2000 | 6,056 |
| 2001 | 6,313 |
| 2002 | 5,503 |
| 2003 | 4,907 |
| 2004 | 6,347 |
| 2005 | 6,480 |
| 2006 | 7,501 |
| 2007 | 7,236 |
| 2008 | 6,572 |
| 2009 | 6,929 |
| Total | 63,844 |
Recent immigrant admissions are at 79 percent of the level beginning in 1979. During the 1979-'83 period, annual admissions averaged about 8,760 immigrants. During the most recent five years, admissions averaged about 6,945 persons.
The charts below show recent immigrant admissions and the cumulative immigrant admissions data since 1965. The number of annual admissions has ranged from 4,299 in FY'99 to 10,522 in FY’80. The cumulative total of admissions to Hawaii between fiscal years 1979 and 2009 was about 220,280 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 Hawaii 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, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Croatia, Macedonia, Montenegro-Serbia, Slovakia and Slovenia.
The 31 nationalities above represent nearly nine-tenths (89%) of all immigrant settlement and adjustment in Hawaii during this ten-year period. The principal source countries for Hawaii's immigrants (Philippines, China, Korea, Vietnam and Japan) accounted for more than four-fifths (83%) of all immigrant admissions since 1996. Immigrants from the Philippines alone accounted for more than half (57.3%) of the total new "green cards".
Poll Data
Hawaii
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?
Hawaii : Immigration Impact
IMPACT ON ENVIRONMENT AND QUALITY OF LIFE
Disappearing Open Space: Each year, Hawaii loses on average 1,400 acres of open space and farmland due to development.1
A study of urban sprawl between 1970 and 1990 that calculated the impact of population increase and per capita land use found that 23.7 square miles of additional land were consumed by urban sprawl in the Honolulu metropolitan area, and 100 percent of that sprawl was attributable to population increase.2
Crowded Housing: An estimated 39,055 of Hawaii's housing units were classified as crowded in 2008, defined as units with more than one occupant per room. This amounted to 8.9 percent of the state's housing units. In addition, 12,101 units were severely crowded, with at least 1.5 occupants per room.3 All three metropolitan areas in Hawaii with more than 65,000 people ranked among the nation's top 20 for crowding in 2008. Kahului-Wailuku is seventh, Hilo is 13th, and Honolulu is 18th.4
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 Hawaii, the shares are 35 percent of children in immigrant families are in crowded housing compared to 23 percent of those in native-headed households.5
Poverty: Hawaii's immigrants are more likely to be poor than their native-born counterparts. In 2007, 9.3 percent of foreign-born households were below the poverty line, compared to 7.7 percent of native households. An additional 8.1 percent of the foreign-born and 5.2 percent of native households were not in poverty but had incomes less than 1.5 times the poverty level.6 19.5 percent of children in immigrant families were poor in 2006, compared to 11.2 percent of native children.7
Traffic:Vehicle traffic on Hawaii highways increased by 24 percent from 1990 to 2008. Unfortunately, its road system has not kept up with the increased volume. Almost three-fourths (75%) of the state's roads are in poor or mediocre condition, resulting in $515 in additional repairs and operating costs for each driver in 2010 (or $456 million statewide).8
Nearly half (45%) of Hawaii's major urban highways were considered "congested" by The Road Information Project (TRIP) in 2010.9 The typical Honolulu commuter lost about 26 hours and burned 18 gallons of fuel due to traffic congestion in 2007, resulting in an estimated cost of $199 million.10 About 17 percent of Hawaii commuters had a commute of 45 minutes or longer in 2008.11
Solid Waste: Hawaii generates 1.4 tons of solid waste per capita each year.12
Education: It is projected that the enrollment of Hawaii's K-12 students will increase by over 20,000 (11 percent) students by the year 2015, to a total K-12 enrollment of 203,000.13 Hawaii's student-teacher ratio of 16.3 currently ranks 38th in the U.S.14
As a result of the swelling student population, schools throughout the state are struggling with overcrowding. Some schools on Windward Oahu and East and Central Honolulu are stretched beyond their physical abilities, and even new schools are finding themselves filled beyond capacity within a few years. Some schools are trying to cope by switching to year-round, multi-track scheduling.15
The state Department of Education forecasts a classroom shortage crisis in the next few years, which will result in even more overcrowding. "New schools, additional classroom building, and additional classrooms to alleviate overcrowding will not be built in sufficient quantities or in a timely manner," says one school official.16
In some areas, like Kane'ohe, classes are being held in converted closets, stage dressing rooms, teacher's lounges, and a patio. In some cases, two classes are forced to share the same room at the same time.17
ENDNOTES:
- "State Rankings by Acreage and Rate of Non-Federal Land Developed," Natural Resources Conservation Service, United States Department of Agriculture.
- Beck, Roy and Leon Kolankiewicz, "Weighing Sprawl Factors in Large U.S. Cities," NumbersUSA, March 2001
- American Community Survey, Three-Year Estimates 2006-2008. Data retrieved using ACS Custom Table tool.
- American Community Survey, One-Year Estimates 2008. Data retrieved using ACS Custom Table tool.
- Kids Count Data Center, which used 2008 American Community Survey Data.
- Migration Information Source State Data (Migration Policy Institute)
- Urban Institute, Children of Immigrants Data Tool.
- The Road Information Project (TRIP), "Key Facts about Hawaii's Surface Transportation System and Federal Funding," May 2010.
- Ibid.
- Texas Transportation Institute, "Urban Mobility Report 2009."
- American Community Survey, 2008 Estimates, Custom Data Table.
- Report Card for America's Infrastructure 2005," American Society of Civil Engineers.
- "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. 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.
- Jennifer Hiller, "Schools Facing Space Crunch," Honolulu Advertiser, January 6, 2002.
- Crystal Kua, "Crisis in Crowded Classrooms," Honolulu Star-Bulletin, January 18, 2002.
- Eloise Aguiar, "Space Crunch Hampers Schools," Honolulu Advertiser, November 25, 2001.
Other Resources
State Local Reform Organizations
State Representatives Voting Record
Updated January 2012