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The ethnonym Mexican-American describes United States citizens of Mexican ancestry (14 million in 2003) and Mexican citizens who reside in the US (10 million in 2003). According to the Pew Hispanic Center, in mid 2001, 4.5 million Mexicans were residing illegally in the United States. Mexican-Americans account for a 64% the Hispanic or Latino population of the USA.
Mexico has been the single largest contributor to American immigration. At least four million Mexicans immigrated to the United States in the 1980s--forty-five percent of the nine million immigrants who entered the country. During the 1990's, approximately five million Mexicans immigrated to the United States. In 2000, Mexican immigration is estimated to have been 350,000 and the most recent estimate (2004) is 500,000 per year. According to Andrés Manuel López Obrador, mayor of Mexico City, the main reason there have not been bursts of social unrest in Mexico is due to Mexican migration to the United States.
The United States has apparent needs for service workers, non-unionized manufacturing workers, farm workers, and skilled artisans. Mexican workers have met those needs. Fear of detection and expulsion keeps many immigrant workers from taking advantage of social welfare programs, which is ironic, and makes them highly vulnerable to exploitation by employers.
Mexico's proximity, a continuous influx of new arrivals, concentration in predominantly Mexican barrios and colonias and Spanish-language media enable Mexican Americans to maintain ties with relatives in Mexico and the Spanish language to a degree not possible for other immigrant groups with their respective countries of origin and native tongues.
Mexican-Americans may sometimes be referred to as Chicanos.
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