Puerto Rican immigrants

SIGNIFICANCE: A small island with more than three million people, Puerto Rico has long been seriously overcrowded, making migration to the mainland United States a useful means of reducing population pressures. As a U.S. commonwealth, Puerto Rico has had an open border with the United States that has allowed Puerto Ricans—U.S. citizens by law—to move so easily to the mainland that by 2003, emigrants from the tiny Caribbean island had become the second-largest Latino ethnic group in the United Statestrailing only immigrants from vastly larger Mexico. This group remained the second largest Latino group through 2021. Although most Puerto Ricans are bicultural and speak both English and Spanish, they also have worked to retain their ethnic identity in the United States both collectively and individuallyeven after more than a century of increasing immigration, provoked mainly by the lure of employment.

Before the Spanish-American War of 1898, the people of the Spanish island colony of Puerto Rico started to evolve a sense of national identity. In 1897after four centuries of Spanish rulethe island’s rich hybrid mixture of Spanish, African, and native Taino and Arawak peoples had acquired a Charter of Autonomy from the Spanish government. Spain’s defeat in the Spanish-American War passed control of Puerto Rico to the United States. Since that time, the island’s people have faced paradoxical tendencies. While a powerful nationalistic streak has continued to imbue islanders with a strong sense of Puerto Rican identity, large numbers of Puerto Ricans flocked to the United States.

Puerto Rico’s Ambiguous Future

For decades, Puerto Rican political debates have focused on one defining question: Should the island declare its independence, apply for U.S. statehood, or continue its hybrid commonwealth status. Puerto Ricans were granted U.S. citizenship by birthright in 1917. Their island’s commonwealth status allows them open access to the United States and many federally provided social servicesbut denies them the right to vote in U.S. elections. Puerto Rico has one nonvoting representative in the U.S. Congressits citizens can vote in U.S. primary elections of political parties but not in national general elections. Additionally, Puerto Ricans are subject to U.S. military servicethey have served in all American wars since 1900.

Puerto Rico has existed as a multicultural society for several centuries. When the Spanish first arrived, it was inhabited by Arawak and Taino peoplemost of whom were killed by European diseases and violent conflict. Spain formerly occupied the island in 1511a full century before England began colonizing North America. By the time the island was acquired by the United States, it already had a university with degrees recognized in Spain and well-defined cultural traditions.

Puerto Ricans began immigrating to the United States even before the Spanish-American War. By 1898, New York City was already home to a small but vigorous community of Puerto Ricansmany of whom were exiles who supported U.S. aid as a measure of liberation from Spain. Some of them cited the American struggle for independence against Great Britain in their calls for greater autonomy for Puerto Rico. Advocates of Puerto Rican independence were profoundly disappointed by the lack of American interest in that goal. The commonwealth status that the United States later granted to Puerto Rico actually restricted Puerto Rican autonomy more severely than the 1897 Charter of Autonomy granted by Spainespecially in extranational matterssuch as trade. However, commonwealth status offers Puerto Ricans the advantages of unrestricted immigration to the United States and integration into the U.S. trade and cultural networks.

New York City as a Point of Entry

After the U.S. occupation of Puerto Rico, immigration to the United States developed slowly. As late as 1910, fewer than 2,000 Puerto Ricans lived in the countryalmost all of them in New York City. By 1930, the Puerto Rican population of the United States had risen to about 40,000. Soon thereafter, however, the main entry-port of New York City was flooded by Puerto Ricans. Substantial Puerto Rican communities were soon established in Brooklyn, the South Bronx, and Manhattan’s EastSpanishHarlem, Lower East Side, parts of the Upper East Side, and Chelsea.

Around this same time, Puerto Rico’s economy was undergoing an important shift. During the last years of Spanish rule, the island produced four main export productssugarcane, coffee, cattle, and tobacco. However, the island’s close association with the United States elevated the importance of sugar, which was cheaper to produce in Puerto Rico than Hawaii or the southern United Stateswhich previously provided most of the sugar consumed in the United States. The shift to a primarily sugar-based economy under U.S. corporate control took place during the second decade of the twentieth century.

The expansion of large-scale sugar production in Puerto Rico drove many small farmers off their land and into shantytowns in San Juan and other cities, while also creating new pressure for emigration. This powerful “push factor” was intensified during the 1920s and 1930s, when the island’s sugarcane industry declined, creating even more unemployment, poverty, and emigration to the United States. As increasing numbers of Puerto Ricans went north, shipping lines established regular routes on which to ferry large numbers of Puerto Ricans between San Juan and New York Citya trip that required four to five days.

Push-Pull Factors, 1940s-1950s

Between 1940 and 1950, the number of Puerto Ricans living in the United States grew by more than 400 percentfrom about 70,000 to more than 300,000including roughly 75,000 children born after their parents’ arrival. After the United States entered World War II in 1941, expanding war production drew still more Puerto Ricans to the mainland, providing the island some relief from widespread unemployment. Meanwhile, the Puerto Rican government sought to diversify the island’s economy by subsidizing industries such as glass, pulp and paper, shoe leather, and other products through the Puerto Rican Development Corporation. This effort, which began as the Fomento Program in 1942, utilized state capitalismreconstituted as “Operation Bootstrap” under the aegis of private ownership.

The “Bootstrap” program was designed to create jobs and provide an independent economic base to reduce emigration pressures. Companiesmostly from the United Stateswere invited to set up plants on the island to take advantage of relatively low wages and tax incentives. With the advent of large-scale jet air travel during the 1960s, the government also promoted tourismmainly from the United States. The program enjoyed mixed success, but it had several side benefitsimprovement of the island’s roads, water supplies, sewage systems, education, and electrical utilities. Medical care also improvedallowing many Puerto Ricans to live longer. Even with these efforts, the number of new jobs created fell short of needs as continuing evictions of small farmers and steady, natural population growth continued to propel emigration to the United States into the 1950s and early 1960s. More than 69,000 Puerto Ricans moved to the United States in 1953 alone.

Rising prosperity in the United States during those years also played a role in drawing immigrants from Puerto Rico. Net annual immigrationwhich had averaged between a few hundred and 8,000 from 1920 through the early 1940srose quickly to 40,000 during the early 1950s. It peaked at almost 80,000 per year during the mid-1950s, then declined rapidly to fewer than 10,000 by the mid-1960s as new jobs opened in Puerto Rico’s own Bootstrap industries. However, many companies that established plants on the island later abandoned them as cheaper labor became available in other countries. As unemployment again rose, so also did emigration from the island.

The large amount of Puerto Rican immigration between the end of World War II and the mid-1960s caused Puerto Rican communities within the United States to grow rapidly. Most new arrivals gravitated to New York City, but Puerto Ricans were beginning to spread out to nearby parts of New Jersey and Connecticut and as far afield as Illinois, California, and Florida.

Immigration and Labor

Most Puerto Ricans immigrated to the United States to find jobs. U.S.-based corporations often played an active role in their immigration by advertising stateside employment on the island. Some basic American industries such as cement making and steel manufacturing actively recruited workers from the island. Waves of migration resulted from labor requirements in specific industriessuch as textiles in New York City and steel mills in Ohio. Many thousands of immigrants also held jobs in seasonal industries, such as farmwork. The idle season in Puerto Rico’s sugarcane industry is summerthe peak season for agricultural labor in the United States.

Demographic Trends

By the time of the 1980 U.S. Census, most Puerto Ricans living in the United States were still concentrated in the Northeast, with 986,802 in New York State alone—an increase of about 50 percent over the figure for 1960. Another 243,540 lived in New Jersey, a 400 percent increase over 1960; 129,165 in Illinois, mostly in and near Chicago, a 400 percent increase over 1960; 88,361 in Connecticut; and 91,802 in Pennsylvania, with a notable community in Philadelphia.

Large Puerto Rican communities in other parts of the United States in 1980 included 94,775 people in Florida, mostly in and near Miami, and 93,038 in California, mostly centered in the Los Angeles area. By 1980, Puerto Ricans were living in every state, with significant numbers even in Alaska (965), Hawaii (19,351), Washington State (5,065), Wisconsin (10,483), and Kansas (2,978).

Between 1960 and 1980, the total Puerto Rican population in the United States rose about 880,000 to almost 2 million. However, only part of this increase was the result of immigration. The rest reflected natural population growth within the United States. By the year 2000, the total Puerto Rican population in the United States was about 3.4 million—a 70 percent increase since 1980.

Beginning during the 1990s, the Puerto Rican population dispersed from New York City, which had been the overwhelming center of demographic gravity, with more than 80 percent of the group’s population within the United States. By 2000, Puerto Ricans in New York City represented only one-quarter of all Puerto Ricans in the United States. However, despite that declining proportion, about 800,000 Puerto Ricans still lived in the city. At the same time, Puerto Ricans in Florida nearly doubled from 247,016 to 482,027 between 1990 and 2000, a 95.1 percent increase. In 2003, a U.S. Census survey found an estimated 760,127 Puerto Ricans in Florida, a 57.7 percent increase in only three years.

In 2015, Puerto Rico’s population was estimated at 3,474,182, down significantly from the census estimate of 4,120,205 in 2007. In 2003, for the first time, the Puerto Rican population in the United States exceeded the number living on the home island. About 4.6 million Puerto Ricans lived in the United States by the 2010 census. In Puerto Rican communities, the phrase aqui y alla“here and there”has been used to describe this mass migration back and forth.

By 2019, the population rose to around 5.83 million which reflected negatively in Puerto Rico's population. As the number of Puerto Rican immigrants in the U.S. increased, the population in Puerto Rico continually decreased—a trend which accelerated following the 2017 Maria and Irma hurricanes.

Puerto Ricans in the United States

By 2000, Puerto Ricans in the United States were earning about $54.5 billion a year—28 percent more than the $42.6 billion earned by fellow Puerto Ricans still on the island. However, immigrants were supplementing island incomes by remitting an estimated $1 billion a year to relatives in Puerto Rico. In 2021, gross national income in the country reached an all-time high at $22,580more than half of the country’s residents still lived in poverty.

Puerto Ricans maintained collective advocacy for political and social rightspreserving their cultural heritage within the context of broader U.S. society. In New York Cityfor examplemany Puerto Ricans have run for elected offices since the 1920s. In 1937, a Puerto Rican was elected to the New York State Assembly for the first time. By 2016, five Puerto Ricans had served in the U.S. House of Representatives—four from New York City and one from Idaho. Puerto Rican mayors have also been elected in such American cities as Miami, Florida; Hartford, Connecticut; and Camden, New Jersey—all with the support of large immigrant populations. Puerto Ricans have been targeted by national political parties as a potential swing vote in New York City and Florida.

Advocacy groups for Puerto Rican immigrantsincluding the educational organization Aspirabegan in New York City in 1961. Others include the National Conference of Puerto Rican Women, the National Puerto Rican Coalition, the National Puerto Rican Forum, and the Puerto Rican Legal Defense and Education Fund. Puerto Rico’s government also maintains services “stateside.” Its Department of Labor has maintained an office in New York City since 1930, its Migration Division opened in New York City in 1948, and had offices in 115 American cities by 2005.

The twenty-first century would see fundamental and widely encompassing changes to historical patterns of Puerto Rican migration to the United States. In addition, these patterns would alter the structure of the Puerto Rican community in the United Stateswhich by the 2020s was multi-generational. These far-ranging impacts impacted newly-arrived Puerto Rican migrants to the US mainland, and its native population inside of Puerto Rico.

In the 2020s, Puerto Rican immigration to the U.S. sharply increased and its population footprint extended beyond traditional areas such as New York City and Florida. This immigration resulted from a combination of factors mainly economic in nature. Beginning in the 1990s and extending for several decades, local mismanagement of the Puerto Rican economy resulted in the island government accruing a substantial level of debt. This harmed local economies and the ability of the island government to fund social services. Puerto Rico saw a net loss of 446,000 people by the mid-2010s. In the late-2010s, a series of devastating natural disastersmost notably Hurricanes Irma and Maria in 2017caused widespread damage to Puerto Rican infrastructures. Buildings such as schools, electrical power generation, and businesses sustained heavy damage and destruction. The presidential administration of Donald Trump (2017-2021) came under widespread criticisms for the inadequacy of U.S. government relief and rebuilding efforts in what many described as a callous disregard of fellow Americans. The Covid-19 pandemicwhich began in 2020and the shortfall in medical services was also impactful. In 2020, an earthquake added to Puerto Rico's complications.

These conditions began to spur large-scale migration of its younger demographics away from Puerto Rico and onto the U.S. mainland. In 2021, those of Puerto Rican descent in the United States numbered 5.8 million. This included the 3.3 American citizens living on Puerto Rico and the 2.5 million on the mainland. This figure represented a 71 percent increase in a two-year time span in the years between 2020 and 2021. By 2021, 28 percent of Puerto Ricans living in the continental US had been born on the island. The median age of Puerto Ricans31 years oldon the mainland was lower than the general U.S. population39 years old. In 2022, the median age of the population residing on the island had risen to 43.7 years of age.

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