Demographics

Arab-Americans Well-Educated, Diverse, Affluent & Highly Entrepreneurial
Over 4 Million Americans Trace Ancestry to Arab Countries
By Samia El-Badry

The vast majority of Arab-Americans are citizens of the United States. They are very much like other Americans, except younger, more educated, more affluent and more likely to own a business. Like any other immigrant group, Arab-Americans want to enjoy America's riches while preserving the important parts of their native culture.

Though Arab-Americans are the least-studied ethnic group in the United States, they receive considerable publicity associated with political and economic events, a good example of which has been the intense focus on the community in the aftermath of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks in New York, Washington and Pennsylvania. While this attention may be of grave political and diplomatic importance, it overshadows Arab-Americans' financial and social impact in the United States.

More importantly, such attention - including the current focus on the community - points out a longstanding problem: Very little is actually publicized and discussed about the make-up of the community. The lack of information, coupled with the media's tendency to use broad strokes to associate Arab-Americans with Arabs in the Middle East, has at times put the community in a defensive position.

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