Entrepreneurship
Are immigrants more likely to start businesses?
Yes. Immigrants are more likely to become entrepreneurs than U.S.-born Americans. Immigrants play an outsized role in business creation and are a crucial part of the U.S. economy.Today, immigrants make up 23.6% of all entrepreneurs nationwide, even though they account for just 14.3% of the U.S. population.
Immigrant entrepreneurs start businesses ranging from neighborhood small shops to some of the largest and most successful companies in the country, including a significant portion of Fortune 500 businesses. They create jobs, generate income, and contribute to economic growth in communities across the United States.
What kind of businesses do immigrants start?
Immigrants start businesses across virtually every sector of the U.S. economy. They are particularly prominent in industries including accommodations and food services, construction, professional services, transportation, retail, and healthcare.For example, immigrants make up one-third of entrepreneurs in the accommodations and food services industry, as well as 26.6% of entrepreneurs in construction.
Immigrant entrepreneurs also start and build companies that grow far beyond the small-business stage. Some of America’s best-known corporations — such as Amazon, Apple, NVIDIA, and Levi Strauss & Co. — were founded by immigrants or their children.
How many people do immigrant-owned businesses employ?
Immigrant-owned businesses provide millions of jobs for American workers. The latest data shows the significant role immigrant-owned and immigrant-founded businesses play in job creation.The impact is especially visible among the country’s biggest and most valuable companies. In the 2025 Fortune 500, a total of 231 companies — nearly half of all Fortune 500 companies — were founded by immigrants or children of immigrants.
These companies include businesses founded directly by immigrants as well as companies founded by the children of immigrants. Of the 231 New American Fortune 500 companies in 2025, 109 were founded by immigrants and 122 were founded by children of immigrants.
Do immigrants create jobs?
Yes. Immigrant entrepreneurs are job creators. New businesses are a major source of job growth in the United States, and immigrants play a particularly important role in business creation.Our research shows that immigrant-founded businesses often grow into major employers and economic engines. Nearly half of the Fortune 500 companies were founded by immigrants or their children. Collectively, these companies employed more than 15.4 million people worldwide and generated $8.6 trillion in revenue in fiscal year 2024.
Immigrant entrepreneurship benefits more than the entrepreneurs themselves: immigrant-founded and immigrant-owned businesses create opportunities for workers, support local economies, and contribute to innovation and economic growth. They have been especially helpful as baby boomers retire, fueling growth in sectors that would have otherwise seen major declines.
How do immigrants contribute to America’s biggest companies?
Immigrants and their children have founded some of America's most influential companies — and their presence among the nation's largest businesses continues to grow.In 2025, 46.2% of Fortune 500 companies were founded by immigrants or their children, the highest share recorded by the Council since we began tracking immigrant-founded Fortune 500 companies in 2011.
Among the 14 companies appearing on the Fortune 500 for the first time in 2025, a total of 10 were founded by immigrants or their children. This included companies rising in the ranks of the Fortune 500, like Ace Hardware and Sirius XM Holdings.
Immigrant-founded and immigrant-descended companies are particularly prominent in major industries. They account for 80% of Fortune 500 companies in professional and other services, 65.6% in manufacturing, and 57.5% in information.
Why are immigrants more likely to become entrepreneurs?
There’s no single reason immigrants have higher rates of entrepreneurship. Starting a business can provide immigrants with an opportunity to use their skills in their new home, pursue economic mobility for themselves and their families, and serve needs in their communities.Immigrants also bring skills, knowledge, experiences, and connections from around the world. Their businesses range from local ventures to companies that operate on a global scale.
It’s worth noting, however, that the United States doesn’t have a dedicated visa specifically for immigrant entrepreneurs, despite relying heavily on their contributions. This gap can make it difficult for promising foreign entrepreneurs to establish and grow businesses in the United States — even when they have the resources and ideas to do so. Coupled with increasingly restrictive U.S. immigration policies, it has become even more difficult to drive international talent to this country.
Supporting immigrant entrepreneurs — and creating streamlined pathways that allow talented entrepreneurs to build and grow businesses in the United States — can help strengthen the U.S. economy, provide jobs to Americans, and build up local communities.
Judge Rules That Foreign Entrepreneurs Can Come to the United States to Grow Their Businesses
Foreign entrepreneurs who want to build innovative companies in the United States received good news on Friday, when federal judge James E. Boasberg of the U.S. District Court ruled in favor of a lawsuit brought by the National Venture Capital Association (NVCA), entrepreneurs, and startup companies on September 19, 2017. Read More
Fox News: White House releases ‘explosive’ tally of green cards issued in ‘chain migration’
For the first time, the White House said, the federal government has counted the green cards issued between 2005 and 2015 to migrants admitted through family preference, or as immediate relatives of migrants already admitted into the country in perhaps the fullest portrait of “chain migration” ever developed. Read More
Company Founder, a Chinese Immigrant, Brings Factory Jobs from Asia to Maryland
In 2011, Chesapeake Bay Candle hit a unique milestone. That was the year the company, which manufactures high-end decorative candles, moved a significant portion of its production operations out of Vietnam and began manufacturing its products in a factory near Maryland’s Eastern Shore. Photo: Sherri Cunningham / CC… Read More
The Wall Street Journal: Why Immigrants Make Great Entrepreneurs
Outsiders face a tough struggle fitting into a new culture. They must figure out how to deal with, and overcome, frustration, loneliness and a steep learning curve. And that’s why immigrants make such great entrepreneurs—they’re once again outsiders facing many of the same kinds of obstacles. Been there, done that. I’ve been… Read More
Immigrants are ‘Our Colleagues, Our Employees’ Says Advocate
Maria Teresa Borden, a journalist-turned-communications professional, was born in the United States, but she has an intimate understanding of the reasons people leave their native countries to start new lives. Her parents were refugees who fled Cuba after the revolution. And in Texas, where she lived from the age of… Read More
Israeli Immigrant Offers Middle East Flavor and Philanthropy to Iowa City
When Naftaly Stramer became a U.S. citizen in 2001, the judge presiding over the ceremony had inspiring words for the diverse group of new Americans: “You are becoming American citizens and you are pledging allegiance to the United States, but don’t forget the heritage that you came from. You are… Read More
After Fleeing Pinochet, Family Endures the Long Wait of U.S. Policy
Though born in Connecticut, successful entrepreneur and videographer Max Moraga has experienced xenophobia and the consequences of U.S. immigration policy firsthand. As a child, the first-generation Chilean-American was targeted for his Hispanic heritage. He was walking past the supermarket in his largely white, rural Connecticut town one day, when a… Read More
Mexican Contractor Started From Scratch, Now Builds Jobs
In August 2017, Salvador Ayala fulfilled a lifelong dream. The Bucks County, Pennsylvania, business owner purchased a house for his family — in cash. “That was a huge accomplishment for me,” says Ayala, a former undocumented immigrant from Mexico, who now owns Sal Home Improvement, a painting and remodeling company… Read More
Business Insider: Immigrant Entrepreneur Expanding Third Company
Immigrant entrepreneurs are the lifeblood of our nation’s diverse economy. One local woman is demonstrating that in central Florida. While the immigration issue itself is making heated headlines across the nation, the fact remains that immigrant entrepreneurs started 40 percent of the top Fortune 500 companies, including Google, Instagram and… Read More
Immigrant Entrepreneur’s Message to Washington: Do What’s Right, Not What’s Popular
Miriam, a popular brunch spot in Park Slope Brooklyn, has served one million eggs since it opened in 2005. The Mediterranean restaurant, known for its Arab-influenced Israeli foods like Shakshuka and Sabich eggplant sandwiches, frequently has lines out the door on the weekends. These days, gourmet Israeli cuisine is common… Read More
America's story is an immigrant story.
