the Hebrew Immigrant Aid Society (HIAS) assisted 6358 Jewish refugees from the Soviet Union during the first nine months of 1977, a 16 percent increase over the corresponding period in 1976, according to Gaynor I. Jacobson, executive vice-president of HIAS. Soviet Jews accounted for 92 percent of the agencyï¿??s overall caseload, he said.
Of the 6358 Soviet Jews assisted, 5615 arrived in the United States; 315 settled in Australia and New Zealand; 270 came to Canada; and 143 went to Western Europe and 15 to Latin America. The 5615 Soviet Jews helped to the U.S. were initially resettled in 116 communities in 33 states as well as the District of Columbia.
According to Jacobson, of those who arrived in the U.S., 2714 were males and 2901 were females; 1441 were age 20 and under, 2705 were from 21 to 50 years of age and 1469 were 51 and older.
Further analysis, Jacobson reported, indicated that 3414 were in the labor force, equally divided between men and women. This labor force comprised 475 engineers, 252 technicians and 818 other professionals.
Women outnumbered men among the professionals (31%-17%), white collar workers (28%-7%) and in service occupations (19%-13%). The reverse was true in engineering (19% men -8% women) and in the blue collar field (31% men 4% women).
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The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
