The Metropolis Institute reports that 22% of Americans are bilingual in English and Spanish, compared to 30% of Canadians in English and French. Canada’s higher overall bilingualism reflects immigration and stronger economic incentives, while U.S. rates remain limited, especially among non-Hispanics. Regional variations shape outcomes.
-- A new report issued by the Metropolis Institute reveals that an estimated 22% of Americans are able to hold a conversation in both English and Spanish. America’s most common form of bilingualism is on the rise driven by growing numbers of Spanish-speakers in the second-largest Spanish-speaking nation globally. “While English-Spanish bilingualism is on the rise in the United States, it’s still lags behind English-French bilingualism in Canada where some 30% of the population reports an ability to hold a conversation in the country’s two dominant languages” said Jack Jedwab author of the report and President and CEO of the Association for Canadian Studies and the Metropolis Institute.
The overall percentage of bilinguals (the ability to speak any two languages or more) is higher in Canada than in the United States owing largely to the higher number of immigrants in the former.
In both countries the real test of whether bilingualism is deepening is best determined by the extent to which America’s non-Hispanics are able to speak Spanish and Canada’s non-French population can speak French. The report finds that about one in ten non-Hispanic Americans are able to hold a conversation in Spanish while some one in five Canadians are able to do so in French. There are important regional variations in the two countries in rates of bilingualism with the Northeastern part of the United States displaying rates of English-Spanish bilingualism (12%) that are similar to parts of Western Canada.
“The higher concentration of Spanish speakers in the Northeast US and the concentration of French in the Canadian province of Quebec is a key driver in the degree of bilingualism in the two countries” said Dr. Jedwab
Finally the report examines the degree to which bilingualism in the two countries generates higher income. The data suggest that this is less the case amongst US non-Hispanic Spanish speakers than it is for non-francophone French speakers in Canada. “The absence of economic incentives for second language knowledge is likely a key factor in the lower rates of bilingualism in the US compared with Canada where the incentive(s) are greater for French second language speakers” concluded Jack Jedwab
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