A new study released Friday suggests that the number of undocumented immigrants living in the U.S. may be double what was previously thought.

The U.S. government estimates the number of undocumented immigrants to be from 11 to 12 million. But researchers from Yale University and Massachusetts Institute of Technology reveal what was described as a “conservative” number of 16. 7 million in 2016 and an average of 22 million. The estimate is based on data from 1990 to 2016.

Researchers used a model that estimates how many undocumented immigrants flow into the country and subtracted how many flow out in order to calculate the total undocumented population. They based their study on data collected from deportations, border apprehensions, visa overstays, death rates and immigration rates.

We look into the study and discuss the methodology.

Guest:

Jonathan Feinstein, professor of economics and management at Yale School of Management, who co-authored the study "The number of undocumented immigrants in the United States: Estimates based on demographic modeling with data from 1990 to 2016"