The US Eligible-to-Naturalize Population: Detailed Social and Economic Characteristics

Naturalization is crucial to fully integrating immigrants into U.S. society, yet from 2006 to 2009 only 69 percent of immigrants who were eligible to be naturalized had done so.

In working to increase naturalization rates, policy-makers and practitioners have been hampered by a lack of reliable data on the naturalization-eligible population, This paper attempts to resolve this problem. In their paper The US Eligible-to-Naturalize Population: Detailed Social and Economic Characteristics, authors Robert Warren and Donald Kerwin use an estimation procedure from the American Community Survey to reveal that 8.6 million U.S. residents were eligible to naturalize in 2013 including 2.7 million Mexican-born immigrants. Looking at the characteristics of these residents, the authors report that a large number of naturalization-eligible immigrants may have difficulty in meeting naturalization requirements or may need intensive support to do so. Reasons for this include a lack of English language skills, which prevents their passing the required English proficiency test, and low income, which makes naturalization fees a financial burden. The authors encourage federal, state, local and non-governmental agencies to reconsider current naturalization policies in light of their data to better focus resources where they are most needed: identifying and supporting specific naturalization-eligible populations to develop sustained increases in naturalization rates. 

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