Legal, illegal immigration seen as driver of population surge

The United States is closing in on a milestone that seemed unthinkable 25 years ago. Sometime in mid-October, we will become a nation of 300 million Americans.

We will then embark on a relatively quick journey to 400 million. Target date: 2041.

How did this young country get so big so quickly?

Immigration, longevity, a relatively high birth rate and economic stability all have propelled the phenomenal growth. The nation has added 100 million people since 1967 to become the world’s third-most populous country after China and India. It’s growing faster than any other industrialized nation.

The biggest driver of growth is immigration – legal and illegal. About 53 percent of the 100 million extra Americans since the 1960s are recent immigrants or their descendants, according to Jeffrey Passel, demographer at the Pew Hispanic Center. Without them, the United States would have about 250 million people today.

The newcomers have transformed an overwhelmingly white population of largely European descent into a multicultural society that reflects every continent on the globe. Some arrived as war refugees. Most came in search of better opportunities in a country that has strong civil rights and a stable economy. Once here, they had babies, which helped the nation maintain a relatively high birthrate that is higher than that of Europe and Japan.

For a country that has equated growth with prosperity throughout much of its history, 300 million is prompting soul-searching about everything from energy use and sprawl, to the consumption of natural resources and border control. The Census Bureau’s population clock meter will hit the momentous number 300 million barely a month before midterm elections in which illegal immigration is a volatile issue.

It also comes at a time when financing of Social Security and Medicare is in jeopardy. As 79 million baby boomers are heading into retirement and live living longer, there are fewer working-age people to support the benefits with their payroll taxes. Some argue that immigrants help fund the system and fill jobs. Others counter that the estimated 12 million immigrants here illegally further strain the social safety net and take jobs away from Americans.

Half of Americans say their communities have grown a lot in the past five years, but more than three-fourths say growth is a minor problem or no problem where they live, according to a USA TODAY-Gallup Poll taken in early June. Though about a third say growth will become a major issue in their communities, more than half say it will be a major problem for the country as a whole. Almost half attribute population growth to immigrants. The poll’s margin of error is plus or minus three percentage points.

“If the growth is well-planned, it’s good for the community,” says Janice McCormac, 67, a resident of Chesterfield, Mo., a St. Louis suburb that grew by just 300 people this decade to about 47,000. “I just never have seen growth as a problem.”

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