MIGRATION AND BUSINESS CYCLES 
of the total number of arriving aliens only in the depression years 
ending June 30, 1876, 1877, 1878, 1879, and 1894. 
The ratio of nonimmigrants to total aliens, in the years ending 
June 30, 1900 to 1924, is given in Table 35. Two features of this 
TABLE 35.—RATIO OF NONIMMIGRANTS TO TOTAL ARRIVING ALIENS: 
1900-1924a 
Years ending June 30 
PERCENTAGE PERCENTAGE 5 PERCENTAGE 
YEAR RATIO YEAR RATIO YEAR RATIO 
1900 5.4b 1909 20.4 1917 18.6 
1901 5.8 1910 13.1 1918 47.8 
1902 4.4 1911 | 14.7 1919 40.5 
1903 3.2 10912 tS 17.6 1920 30.8 
1904 3.3 1913 16.1 1921 17.7 
1905 3.8 1914 13.2 1922 28.4 
1906 5.6 1915 24.8 1923 22.3 
1907 10 6 1916 18.5 1924 19.6 
1908 15.3 
sComputed from data given in the annual reports of the U. S. Commissioner General of Immigration 
and in the Statistical Abstract of the United States. See Table 36 for 1905-1924. 
bFor some of the years from 1900 to 1905, two sets of figures have been published for the number of 
non-immigrants, and the figures here used are the lower of the two sets, selected because they appeared 
more consistent from year to year. Hence it is not safe to conclude that the ratio of nonimmigrants to im- 
migrants actually increased after 1906 to the extent suggested by the data in this table. 
ratio are noteworthy. First, in the last two decades the proportion 
of recorded nonimmigrants to total arrivals substantially increased, 
even before the war; and secondly, the ratio is relatively high in 
and immediately following depression years, and also in the war 
years, suggesting that war and depression both tend to exercise a 
greater check on the flow of immigrants than of nonimmigrants. 
In the depression year 1908 (fiscal), for example, the number of 
immigrants declined 39.1 per cent, as compared with a decline of 
only 7.4 per cent in the number of nonimmigrants. On the other 
hand, the number of nonimmigrants declined more than the number 
of immigrants in 1914, but in 1922 the latter movement again ex- 
hibited the greater sensitiveness to industrial depression. Taken as 
a whole, therefore, the nonimmigrant group seems to be less sen- 
sitive to cyclical changes than the immigrant element. These ten- 
tative conclusions may be verified by reference to Chart 27, which 
appears on page 139 and shows the relative fluctuations in the 
number of male and female immigrants and nonimmigrants, res- 
pectively, in the years 1905 to 1924, inclusive. 
138