Dominicans are on track to become Philadelphia’s largest immigrant group and 3 other takeaways from a new Pew report
This won’t exactly be news to hard-core population nerds. The U.S. Census Bureau has highlighted this dynamic in almost every population data release of recent years. In 2022, 15.7% ofNot all corners of the city are affected by influxes in immigration to the same degree, said Thomas Ginsberg, a senior officer at Pew who coauthored the report with Maridarlyn Gonzalez.
Some 130,000 people identify as Latino in Philadelphia. Notably, about 71% of those Latinos were Puerto Rican and 13% were foreign-born.The Latino population almost doubled, exceeding 252,000 people — and the makeup looked drastically different. Puerto Ricans only accounted for 55% of the population and 22% of Latinos reported being foreign-born. Newcomers born in the Dominican Republic, Mexico, Guatemala, and Colombia led the surge in those years.
The Dominican Republic, however, was not far behind, becoming the second-highest country of origin for the same period with about 22,800 people. According to Pew, Dominicans are on track to become the city’s largest immigrant group.While cities like New York and Boston are direct landing spots for immigrant newcomers, Philadelphia tends to be more of a secondary destination, which researchers say speaks to the city’s affordability and established immigrant communities.