While the number of foreign-born individuals holding jobs increased in August, the number of employed native-born workers fell, according to data released Friday by the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS).
There were 24,914,000 foreign-born individuals employed in August, up 204,000 from the previous month. According to the BLS, a foreign-born worker may be undocumented because the data does not distinguish between legal or illegal immigrants.
"The foreign-born include legally-admitted immigrants, refugees, temporary residents such as students and temporary workers, and undocumented immigrants. The survey does not separately identify the numbers of persons in these categories," according to the BLS.
While employment increased for these individuals over the month, workers born in the United States faced a decline. There were 124,314,000 native-born workers employed in August, which was down 698,000 from the month before.
The unemployment rate, which measures the percentage of the labor force that either had a job or looked for one in the past month, is lower for foreign-born workers than it is for native-born workers.
In August, the unemployment rate for foreign-born workers declined to 4.4 percent from 5.2 percent in July. The unemployment rate of 4.4 percent is lower than the 5.3 percent unemployment rate for native-born workers in August.