My portfolio uses IPUMS data in order to explore trends that differentially affect the outcomes of black Americans and immigrant Americans. By exploring questions of racial declaration, occupational standing, and household and individual metrics, I hope to quantify many of the same trends that researchers have long observed, within the context of a specific historical period. My research largely relied on the age, sex, birthplace, and racial declaration variables, as well as counts of individuals and children fitting specific criteria.  I also drew on earning and education quantile score in order to assess the opportunities available to first-generation Americans. Other variables I used included citizenship status, year of immigration, and parental birthplace.

My first project considered the classification of black-white biracial Americans and how they were classified for census purposes when forced to choose one part of their identities. My second project considered first and second generation Slavic Americans changes in each cohort’s population by census year. Links to prominent events in the early-mid 20th century were also made. My third project utilized the R Shiny framework to interactively explore changes in occupational standing for immigrant Americans by decade and over years-since-immigration. Finally, my last project considered the number of children sharing a household and whether or not this statistic varies with the immigration status of the householder and his/her spouse.  This analysis showed highly similar results at the individual and household analysis levels.

Although error codes and comparability issues made these investigations frustrating at times, the clean and complete nature of the IPUMS-USA database made it an absolute pleasure to explore.