An estimated 625,000 Hispanics of Honduran origin resided in the United States in 2009, according to the Census Bureau’s American Community Survey. Hondurans in this statistical profile are people who self-identified as Hispanics of Honduran origin; this means either they themselves are Honduran immigrants or they trace their family ancestry to Honduras. Hondurans are the eighth-largest population of Hispanic origin living in the United States, accounting for 1.3% of the U.S. Hispanic population in 2009. Mexicans, the nation’s largest Hispanic origin group, constituted 31.7 million, or 65.5%, of the Hispanic population in 2009.¹

This statistical profile compares the demographic, income and economic characteristics of the Honduran population with the characteristics of all Hispanics and the U.S. population overall. It is based on tabulations from the 2009 American Community Survey by the Pew Hispanic Center, a project of the Pew Research Center.² Key facts include:

• Immigration status. Seven-in-ten Hondurans (69%) in the United States are foreign born compared with 37% of Hispanics and 13% of the U.S. population overall. Eight-in-ten immigrants from Honduras (78%) arrived in the U.S. in 1990 or later. Two-in-ten Honduran immigrants (20%) are U.S. citizens.
• Language. Four-in-ten Hondurans (40%) speak English proficiently.³ Some 60% of Hondurans ages 5 and older report speaking English less than very well, compared with 37% of all Hispanics.
• Age. Hondurans are younger than the U.S. population and similar in age to Hispanics overall. The median age of Hondurans is 28; the median ages of the U.S. population and all Hispanics are 36 and 27, respectively.
• Marital status. Hondurans are less likely than Hispanics overall to be married—42% versus 45%.
• Fertility. Nearly four-in-ten (37%) of Honduran women ages 15 to 44 who gave birth in the 12 months prior to the survey were unmarried. That was similar to the rate for all Hispanic women—40%—and the rate for U.S. women—35%.
• Regional dispersion. Six-in-ten Hondurans (61%) live in the South, mostly in Florida and Texas. Some one-in-eight Hondurans (13%) live in California and 9% live in New York.
• Educational attainment. Hondurans have lower levels of education than the Hispanic population overall. Some 49% of Hondurans ages 25 and older—compared with 39% of all U.S. Hispanics—have not obtained at least a high school diploma.
• Income. The median annual personal earnings for Hondurans ages 16 and older were $17,100 in 2009; the median earnings for all U.S. Hispanics were $20,000.
• Poverty status. The share of Hondurans who live in poverty, 27%, is higher than the rate for the general U.S. population (14%) and the rate for Hispanics overall (23%).
• Health Insurance. Half of Hondurans (52%) do not have health insurance compared with 31% of all Hispanics and 15% of the general U.S. population. Additionally, 26% of Hondurans younger than 18 are uninsured.
• Homeownership. The rate of Honduran homeownership (32%) is lower than the rate for all Hispanics (48%) and the U.S. population (66%) as a whole.

About the Data

This statistical profile of Hispanics of Honduran origin is based on the Census Bureau’s 2009 American Community Survey (ACS). The ACS is the largest household survey in the United States, with a sample of about 3 million addresses. The data used for this statistical profile come from 2009 ACS Integrated Public Use Microdata Series (IPUMS), representing a 1% sample of the U.S. population.

Like any survey, estimates from the ACS are subject to sampling error and (potentially) measurement error. Information on the ACS sampling strategy and associated error is available at http://www.census.gov/acs/www/methodology/methodology_main/. An example of measurement error is that citizenship rates for the foreign born are estimated to be overstated in the Decennial Census and other official surveys, such as the ACS (see Jeffrey Passel. “Growing Share of Immigrants Choosing Naturalization,” Pew Hispanic Center, Washington, D.C. (March 28, 2009)). Finally, estimates from the ACS may differ from the Decennial Census or other Census Bureau surveys due to differences in methodology and data collection procedures (see, for example, http://www.census.gov/acs/www/Downloads/methodology/ASA_nelson.pdf, http://www.census.gov/hhes/www/laborfor/laborfactsheet092209.html and http://www.census.gov/hhes/www/poverty/about/datasources/factsheet.html).