In 2008, 24.1 million persons, or 15.6 percent of the U.S. civilian labor force age 16 and over, were foreign born. This is according to data released by the U.S. Department of Labor's Bureau of Labor Statistics.
By region, the foreign born made up a larger share of the total labor force in the West (24.1 percent) and in the Northeast (17.9 percent) than for the nation as a whole.
In contrast, the shares of the labor force made up by foreign-born workers in the South (13.8 percent) and Midwest (7.8 percent) were less than for the nation.
This data is from the Current Population Survey. Find more information in "Foreign-born Workers: Labor Force Characteristics in 2008," (PDF) (HTML) news release USDL 09- 0303.
