The Ethnic Composition of U.S. Inventors

The contributions of immigrants to U.S. technology formation are staggering. While the foreign-born account for just over 10 percent of the U.S. working population, they represent 25 percent of the U.S. science and engineering workforce and nearly 50 percent of those with doctorates. 

The magnitude of these ethnic contributions raises many questions: debates regarding the appropriate quota for H1-B temporary visas, the possible crowding out of native students from the science and engineering fields, the brain-drain or brain-circulation effect on sending countries, and the future prospects for U.S. technology leadership.  

This paper applies an ethnic-name database to individual patent records granted by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office to document these trends with greater detail than previously available.  

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