Diversity in the United States
California's foreign-born share went from 15% to 27% between 1980 and 2018 — but the rest of the country tells a more uneven story. An interactive hex map across all 50 states and four data dimensions: foreign-born share, education, languages spoken at home, and immigration status.
The Question
How has American diversity changed over four decades? This interactive dashboard examines the foreign-born population across all 50 states through four lenses: percentage of foreign-born residents, educational attainment, languages spoken at home, and immigration status.
The hex tile map gives each state equal visual weight regardless of geographic size — surfacing demographic patterns that traditional choropleths obscure. Users can scrub across decades and switch between data dimensions to watch the story unfold.
The Dashboard
Key Numbers
Findings
- Immigration is concentrating, not spreading out. Six states hold over 60% of the country's foreign-born population. California alone has about a quarter. New York, Texas, and Florida follow. That clustering got tighter between 1980 and 2018, not looser.
- Immigrants got more educated faster than the native-born did. The share of foreign-born residents with a bachelor's degree doubled from 16% to 32% — driven by visa-policy changes and a shift in where people are coming from.
- Language diversity tracks economic activity. The states with the most non-English speakers at home — California, Texas, New Jersey — are also among the top GDP contributors. Linguistic diversity doesn't replace economic muscle; it shows up where the economy is loudest.