Sub-Saharan African Immigrants in the U.S. Are Often More Educated than Those in Top European Destinations

As the annual number of migrants from sub-Saharan Africa to both the United States and Europe has grown for most years this decade, a Pew Research Center analysis of 2015 U.S. Census Bureau and Eurostat data finds that sub-Saharan immigrants in the U.S. tend to be more highly educated than those living in the United Kingdom, France, Italy and Portugal -- Europe's historically leading destinations among sub-Saharan immigrants. Historically, sub-Saharan immigrants have made up small shares of the total population in the U.S., UK, France, Italy, and Portugal -- 3% or less in each country, as of 2015. But annual migration to the U.S. and Europe from sub-Saharan Africa rose most years this decade. In all, well more than a million sub-Saharans have migrated to the U.S. and to EU countries, Norway, and Switzerland since 2010. Migration pressures for some sub-Saharans to leave Africa are expected to continue as the continent's population grows, young people struggle to find employment, and protracted conflicts continue. In this report, total migrant population estimates across destination countries of sub-Saharan immigrants are from the United Nations. These estimates were used to determine top destinations and origins of sub-Saharan immigrants. The demographic and economic characteristics of sub-Saharan African immigrants living in the U.S. and top European destinations in 2015 were drawn from two sources: (1) the U.S. Census Bureau's American Community Survey and (2) Eurostat's Labor Force Survey.