The U.S. Census Bureau and other federal agencies keep track of many different statistics for each ethnic group, which help guide government policies. Many of these statistics have been compiled by the New Century Foundation, in its 2006 report Hispanics: A Statistical Portrait. This report provides a great deal of eye-opening information about the Hispanic community, including many of the social problems it faces, and includes the sources of the information below.

The great majority of Hispanics — 66 percent — are of Mexican origin. No less than ten percent of the population of Mexico now lives in the United States, and one out of every seven Mexican workers migrates here. Many more would like to come: According to a recent survey, almost half of all Mexicans said that they would move to the United States if they had the chance. The 33 percent of Hispanics who are not from Mexico are often quite different, with Cuban immigrants generally more economically successful than those from Mexico, Central America, or Puerto Rico.

In the U.S., many Hispanics are hard-working, decent people who adhere to their Catholic faith and have commendable family values. However, as discussed earlier, Hispanics in the U.S. have an average IQ of 87, which is 13 points below that of Whites. Because we know that IQ is an important predictor of success in society, we would expect that Hispanics have higher rates of poverty and social problems, which appears to be the case.

In 2004, the median per capita income of Hispanics was about half that of whites — $14,100 as opposed to $27,500. This gap has increased since 1972. In 2005, nearly a quarter of Hispanic families — 23 percent — were living in poverty, a rate close to that of blacks, and 2.6 times the white rate. According to economist Robert J. Samuelson, the growth in the number of poor Hispanics is the main reason poverty is growing in the United States despite decades of efforts to fight it.

Part of the problem is unemployment. Although Hispanics have the reputation of accepting work others will not take in 2004, Hispanics were about 50% more likely to be unemployed than whites.

Hispanics also do not put a high priority on saving compared to other ethnic groups. The net worth of Hispanic households is only 9% that of Whites, which hasn’t changed much in the past 10 years.

Because of their low incomes, Hispanics are the major population group most likely to use welfare: In 2004, 50 percent of Hispanic households used at least one form of welfare, compared to 47 percent of blacks and 18 percent of whites. In 2005, 13 percent of Hispanic households used food stamps, as opposed to five percent of white households. Non-citizens are generally ineligible for many forms of welfare; if many Hispanics were to gain citizenship, Hispanic welfare use would rise. Each Hispanic person is a major burden to taxpayers, collecting thousands of dollars more in government services than he pays in taxes. For example, in Los Angeles, a city with a large Hispanic population, “one in five Los Angeles County residents — nearly 2.2 million people — are receiving public assistance payments or benefits”.

Hispanics are 3.3 times more likely to be in prison than whites; they are 4.2 times more likely to be in prison for murder. Hispanics commit high rates of other violent crimes, such as robbery and vehicle theft. Hispanics are also 5.8 times more likely to be in prison for felony drug crimes. High drug offense rates reflect Mexico’s role as an important source of drugs: 92 percent of the cocaine sold in the United States comes through Mexico, and it is our largest supplier of marijuana and second largest supplier of heroin.

Studies indicate that Hispanics are more likely to commit other offenses as well. For example, in California, Hispanics were 42 percent more likely than whites to be arrested for drunk driving.

Illegal Aliens are also a major crime problem. For example, in Los Angeles in 2004, 95 percent of the 1,200 to 1,500 outstanding warrants for homicide were issued against illegal aliens, almost all of whom were Hispanic. Up to two-thirds of the city’s 17,000 fugitive felony warrants were for illegal immigrants. There were 267,000 criminal aliens in all prisons and jails in 2003, about three quarters of whom were Hispanic.

Hispanic communities are much more violent places to live than for other ethnic groups. Hispanics are 2.9 times more likely to die from homicide than whites (blacks are eight times more likely), and are 3.4 times more likely than whites to die from gunshot wounds (blacks are 11 times more likely).

One study found that Hispanic men are more than two and a half times more likely than whites to batter wives or girlfriends.

In a disturbing sign for the future, young Hispanics are no less than 19 times more likely than whites of the same ages to be members of youth gangs (blacks are 15 times more likely). MS-13, the largest and most notorious Hispanic gang has an estimated 10,000 members and recruits heavily among young men.

Poverty and crime are invariably more common among Americans who do not finish high school, and most studies suggest Hispanics are more likely to drop out than any other group. For 2002, Jay P. Greene of the Manhattan Institute found a national graduation rate of only 52 percent for Hispanics, as opposed to 57 percent for blacks and 78 percent for whites. The Civil Rights Project at Harvard reported similar results in a 2005 study.

To some extent, Hispanics’ low graduation rates reflect the language and cultural barriers faced by immigrants. US-born Hispanics do better than the foreign-born, but according to a government survey of adults, even Hispanics who have been in the United States for more than three generations are twice as likely as whites and slightly more likely than blacks to report not having a high school diploma.

Hispanics who remain in school have lower test scores than whites. In 2004, their reading scores were the same as blacks. In a disturbing indication of future levels of productivity, on average, black and Hispanic 12th-graders read worse than white 8th-graders, and there is a similar pattern in math scores. Despite considerable efforts, the achievement gaps have grown wider since the 1990s.

Hispanics are the least likely of the major population groups to attend college. In 2003, 28 percent of Hispanics aged 18 to 24 were enrolled in college, compared to 38 percent of blacks and 52 percent of whites. As shown in Figure 14, most groups have increased college attendance rates, but between 1974 and 2003, rates for Hispanic men declined.

Enrolling in college does not ensure graduation. A study by the National Center for Education Statistics found that 62 percent of whites who started four-year colleges in 1995 had graduated six years later, but only 44 percent of Hispanics and an equal percentage of blacks. Hispanics who do receive degrees have excellent opportunities, and receive slightly higher wages than whites when matched for education and occupation.

One difficulty Hispanics face is that Spanish is so firmly entrenched in some areas that many immigrants may feel no pressure to learn English. In 2003, 44 percent of Hispanics did not speak and read English well enough to perform routine tasks, while in 1992 the percentage was 35 percent. This means the illiteracy rate for Hispanic adults rose during the decade (Figure 17), whereas it declined for every other major population group.

Fifty-three percent of working age residents in Los Angeles County have trouble reading street signs and filling out job applications in English. In the nation as a whole, nine percent of fourth-grade students are classified as “English Language Learners,” but this number rises to 54 percent in heavily-Hispanic Los Angeles.

Limited English can impose burdens on others. In 2002, the Office of Management and Budget estimated the costs of implementing Executive Order 13166, which required agencies receiving federal funds to serve people who do not speak English. OMB had not yet gathered the data to calculate a total figure, but it estimated the annual cost would be $268 million for hospitals and $8.5 million for state departments of motor vehicles. The annual cost of language services to food stamp recipients was expected to be $25.2 million.

Hispanics have the highest fertility of any major population group, and their teenage birthrates are especially high, over 4 times the White rate.  One reason for high fertility among Hispanics is the large number of young people. In 2005, their median age was 27.2, whereas the median age for whites was 40.3. In 2003, the illegitimacy rate for children born to Hispanic mothers was 45 percent, nearly double the white rate.

Despite their youth, Hispanics are in relatively poor health. Thirty-three percent of Hispanics are uninsured, vs. 11 percent of whites and 20 percent of blacks. The majority of immigrants from Mexico, Honduras, El Salvador and Guatemala are without health insurance, which means they must be treated at public expense, and are likely to put off doctor visits until their conditions are relatively serious.

Hispanics are three times more likely than whites to die of AIDS, and four times more likely to die of tuberculosis. They have higher rates of other diseases such as diabetes and Hepatitis as well. Mexican adults ages 18-64 are 90 percent more likely than whites to have untreated cavities. Hispanics are also 77 percent more likely than whites to be hit and killed by cars.

Mexican and white men are about equally likely to be obese, but Mexican women are 24 percent more likely than white women to be obese. Children show a more disturbing trend. Boys ages 6-11 of Mexican origin are 89 percent more likely to be obese than white boys, and Mexican girls in the same age group are 31 percent more likely to be obese than white girls. Hispanics are 32 percent less likely than whites to exercise regularly.

Illegal immigrants enter the country without health screening, and some bring diseases not normally found in the United States. Polio, typhoid, tuberculosis, plague, leprosy, and dysentery are still rare but are increasing. Outbreaks are almost always traced to immigrants, many of them Hispanic.

Low-income groups use more in government services than they pay in taxes. The National Academy of Sciences, calculates that over a lifetime, the average adult Mexican immigrant will collect $55,200 more in government services than he or she will pay in taxes. A North Carolina study found that Hispanics as a group represented an annual net cost of $61 million, or $102 per Hispanic. This estimate considered only education, medicine, and corrections.

There is more research on the costs of illegal immigration. The Federation for American Immigration Reform estimates Hispanic illegal immigrants are a net cost to the country as a whole of $45 billion. FAIR estimates that the net cost to state and local governments for the education, incarceration, and emergency medical care of illegal aliens is $36 billion. The net cost to California is $8.8 billion, or $1,183 per native household, and for Texas it is $3.73 billion, or $725 per household. Children of illegal immigrants cost public schools $28.6 billion annually, and 70 percent of the increase in enrollment in public schools from 1991 to 2001 is due to immigration.

Whether they have immigrated legally or not, Hispanic students often cost more to educate because of language difficulties. In Arizona, for example, it costs $1,200 more each year to teach a student with limited English. For the 2005-06 school year, Texas appropriated more than a billion dollars for language education, which constituted 3.5 percent of its total budget. For fiscal year 2006, the federal government, which pays only a small fraction of local school expenses, spent $669 million on English teaching.

These numbers reflect only language-related programs. For the 2006 fiscal year, the federal government allocated $13 billion for Title I schools, which have low achievement records and serve poor students. Hispanics frequently attend schools that qualify for Title I aid.

The cost of imprisoning criminal aliens is considerable. From 2001 to 2004, the federal government spent $1.5 billion each year both for its own criminal alien prisoners and on reimbursements to state and local governments. Reimbursements do not cover all local costs. Every year, the states of Arizona, California, Florida, and New York spend a total of about $600 million more on criminal aliens than they receive from the federal government. Four local jail systems with large criminal alien populations spend a combined $160 million a year over their reimbursements.

Federal law requires hospitals to treat all comers, whether they are legally in the country or not. In California alone, the heavy cost of free medicine for illegal aliens — the overwhelming majority of whom are Hispanic — forced 60 hospitals to shut down between 1993 and 2003; many more are on the verge of collapse.

Hispanics are a relatively disadvantaged population that can be expected to require social services. However, their need for services is not independent of their own financial decisions. In 2004, Mexicans sent $20 billion in remittances to their home country, and other Latin American immigrants sent another $10 billion, sums that could have paid for a considerable amount of medical insurance.

As noted earlier, two thirds of the Hispanics in the United States are of Mexican origin. For historical and geographic reasons, this is a potential cause for concern. Mexico is the only nation in the world that, at least in the popular mind, has a historical claim on portions of the United States. Mexicans are still bitter over the loss of territory that followed the Mexican-American War, and many believe the United States does not have the moral right to control its own borders.

No fewer than 58 percent of Mexicans agree with the statement, “the territory of the United States’ Southwest rightfully belongs to Mexico.” Only 28 percent disagree. Likewise, 57 percent agree that “Mexicans should have the right to enter the U.S. without U.S. permission,” while 35 percent disagree.  Perhaps historic resentment helps explain why only 36 percent of Mexicans say they hold a positive view of Americans whereas 84 percent of Americans say they hold a positive view of Mexicans. Seventy-three percent of Mexicans say Americans are racist, and only 16 percent say Americans are honest.

After they come to the United States, Mexicans retain longer and stronger attachments to their country of origin than do immigrants who have come greater distances. Only 34 percent of Mexicans eligible for US citizenship actually become Americans, the lowest figure for any national group.

When they become citizens, Hispanics remain emotionally attached to their countries of origin. In a poll taken by the Pew Hispanic Center, only 33 percent of American citizens of Hispanic origin considered themselves first or only American. Forty-four percent still described themselves as their original, pre-immigration nationality (Mexican, Salvadoran, etc.), and another 22 percent considered themselves first or only “Latino or Hispanic.” Surrounded by compatriots, and with their country of origin just across the border, it is likely that U.S. citizens of Mexican origin identify even less strongly than other Hispanics with the United States.

It is legitimate to wonder whether it is wise for the United States to welcome large numbers of Mexicans, especially when their population is concentrated in those parts of the United States to which Mexicans have an emotional claim. An organization known as MEChA (the Spanish acronym for “Chicano Student Movement of Aztlan”) actively promotes the view that the southern border of the United States is illegitimate, and even flirts with the idea of expelling non-Hispanics from the territories lost by Mexico and establishing an all-Hispanic nation to be known as Aztlan. It has an estimated 400 chapters in universities and high schools, mainly in the American West.

The political interests of Hispanic citizens remain anchored in ethnic loyalties. A poll by Investor’s Business Daily found that amnesty for illegal immigrants and easing of restrictions are so important for 70 percent of Hispanic-Americans that their vote hinges on this question alone. Should there ever be a sharp conflict between the United States and Mexico or any other Hispanic country, it is not difficult to predict on which side of the controversy many Hispanics — citizens or non-citizens — would fall.

The problems that Hispanics have in assimilating is troubling. Most Americans believe a citizen’s first identification should be as an American, not as a “Honduran” or a “Latino.” It is not reassuring for non-Hispanics to learn that only one third of Hispanic citizens think of themselves as Americans first. Mexico changed its laws in 1998 to permit dual nationality, which encourages Mexicans to take American citizenship while maintaining Mexican loyalty.

Even staunch advocates for Hispanics recognize that large-scale immigration brings potentially serious problems. Roberto Suro of the Pew Hispanic Center has written that “Latino immigration could become a powerful demographic engine of social fragmentation, discord, and even violence,” adding that Hispanics could “replace blacks as the face of intergenerational poverty.” High Hispanic dropout rates and young-gang affiliation are ominous indicators of this possibility.

For the past 50 years, the United States has poured tremendous efforts into fighting poverty, disease, crime, and school failure. We should think very carefully about policies that encourage demographic changes that may lead to setbacks in these efforts and that could burden future generations with increasingly difficult problems.