NEW YORK, July 24 (Xinhua) -- As the U.S. government tightens rules on immigration, a new study found that immigrant entrepreneurs are indispensable to the success of the U.S. economy.
According to New American Economy (NAE), 44.6 percent of American companies on the 2019 Fortune 500 list were founded by immigrants or their children, amassing 6.1 trillion U.S. dollars in revenue and employing over 13.5 million people.
Similar volume in gross domestic product (GDP) would cause any country to be "the third largest economy in the world, behind only the United States and China," the study that came out on Monday said.
As the study noted, "foreign-born individuals" and their children created not only American household brands such as Apple and Costco, but also some newcomers to the Fortune 500 list like Broadcom and Intuit.
New York, California and many other states counted on immigrant entrepreneurs for economic growth and job creation.
For example, immigrant-founded Fortune 500 companies in New York yielded a revenue equaling 56.3 percent of the state's GDP and employed nearly 2 million people.
The study also mentioned the "significant role" of immigrants and their children in small and medium-sized businesses, since nearly 3.2 million immigrants run their own business in the United States.
The NAE's findings coincided with a report released by Citigroup and Oxford University in September 2018, which indicated two-thirds of U.S. GDP expansion since 2011 were "directly attributable to migration."
Any cuts to immigration would hobble economic gains and hinder innovation, lead author Ian Goldin told the Financial Times.
The NAE, launched by Michael Bloomberg and Rupert Murdoch, is a research and advocacy group consisting of business leaders and mayors in the United States and aimed at influencing local immigration reform.
