In an unexpected twist, it seems fewer undocumented immigrants are holding blue-collar jobs in the wake of the Great Recession -- yet more such immigrants are working in professional or white-collar jobs.

A new report issued by the Pew Research Center this week unveiled new estimates taking a closer look at U.S.-born and unauthorized immigrant workers in the nation by major occupations reflected some interesting notes and trends.

The study finds that the amount of undocumented immigrants taking so-called "white collar" jobs in management or professional work increased by 180,000, marking a 3 percent spike in the share of all undocumented workers in said jobs from 10 percent in 2007 to 13 percent in 2012.

Yet, that figure is still less than half than that of native born workers in the same fields, 36 percent of which hold those positions.

By contrast, fewer such immigrants appear to be taking jobs in construction or production, with jobs among undocumented workers in those respective sectors falling by roughly 475,000, a 5-percent dip among all unauthorized immigrants within those U.S. jobs from 34 percent in 2007 to 29 percent in 2012.

However, despite those numbers indicating that more undocumented immigrants are taking up higher-end jobs, foreign-born workers still tend to be oriented in lower-skill jobs. The report cites new estimates derived from government data that show 62 percent of foreign-born workers still take up jobs in production, construction and service -- a figure that's roughly twice as high as that of their native born counterparts.

In 2013, roughly 25.3 million foreign-born workers made up approximately 16.3 percent of the entire U.S. labor force, according to statistics on the foreign-born labor force in the U.S. released in May 2014 by the Bureau of Labor Statistics from the U.S. Department of Labor. Of that amount, Latinos comprised nearly half, or 47.8 percent, of foreign-born U.S. workers that year. Among minorities, Hispanics had the second-highest unemployment rates at 7.5 percent among foreign-born workers, and the second-highest unemployment rates among native born laborers at 10.5 percent. The department found that in 2013, immigrant laborers were more likely than native born workers to be working service jobs building and grounds cleaning and maintenance operations.

Furthermore, the department's analysis found, immigrant laborers were also more likely to be working in transportation, production and material moving jobs, as well as jobs that involve construction, natural resources and maintenance. Earnings-wise, Hispanic foreign-born laborers who worked full-time and salaried positions were found to be earning roughly 78.2 percent as much as their native-born counterparts during that year.

The Pew study notes that the workforce when it comes to undocumented immigrants tends to fluctuate within each state, with more undocumented immigrants working in states that have larger shares of the nation's undocumented immigrant population such as Nevada (10.2 percent in 2012), California (9.4 percent) and Texas (8.9 percent).

On another note, it seems federal statistics find that both foreign-born and native laborers earn more as their education levels improve. As the Labor Department noted from their 2013 data, foreign-born workers ages 25 and up with less than a high school education made weekly earnings of only $428. By contrast, those with a bachelor's degree and higher made a weekly income of $1,235, nearly three times higher than their less educated counterparts.

However, the numbers pointed to a gap still existing between native and foreign-born members of the labor force at different educational attainment levels. For example, foreign-born workers earned only 83.3 percent as much as native rivals when it came to labor stats for those with a high school diploma or less. When it comes to those with a bachelor's degree or higher, the gap was much smaller, with earnings being "essentially the same" between both native and foreign-born members of the labor force.