Flow of Immigrants’ Money to Latin America Surges
According to a new report about immigrants’ money transfers to Latin America, the remittances flow from almost every state. Even in states that had virtually no Latin American immigrants only a few years ago, like Mississippi and Pennsylvania, a growing trickle of money is making its way south to places like Tlalchapa, Mexico, or Panajachel, in the Guatemalan highlands.
“Twenty years ago the money was coming from four or five states; now it’s coming from every corner of the country,” said Sergio Bendixen, a Miami pollster who surveyed some 2,500 immigrants, legal and illegal, for the survey on which the report was based.
For the nation as a whole, the flow of money has become a torrent. According to the study, sponsored by the Multilateral Investment Fund of the 47-nation Inter-American Development Bank, remittances from the United States to Latin America this year will total more than $45 billion. That is 51 percent higher than they were only two years ago.
About three-quarters of Latino immigrants who were surveyed send money home regularly, up from some 60 percent in a similar survey in 2004.