Immigrants Flock to These U.S. Cities

These gateways are cities like Atlanta, Phoenix, Charlotte, N.C., and Austin, Texas--places with sprawling suburbs that are drawing immigrants for various reasons. Some, like Austin, are high-tech centers that offer abundant technology jobs. Others, like Atlanta, are emerging as major international hubs.

In all cases, the native-born population has also grown rapidly along with economic growth. Not surprisingly, many of these cities appear near the top of our list of metro areas with the greatest increases in immigrant populations, including Charlotte (a 64% increase), Phoenix (61%) and Atlanta (58%).

An additional note on our analysis: It accounts for only those metro areas with foreign-born populations of more than 65,000; the Census Bureau doesn't provide detailed annual data for population groups smaller than that. Foreign-born residents account for about 12.6% of the U.S. population. Our findings include cities where this group ranges from 5% to 22% of the total.