America’s white population shrinks for the first time as nation ages
The clock keeps ticking..as the nation's demographics inexorably change.
"The number of non-Hispanic white people in the United States decreased for the first time in the nation’s history between 2015 and 2016, according to new figures released Thursday by the U.S. Census Bureau.
The data show the nation’s white population is aging rapidly, as Americans delay their decision to have a family and as the flow of foreign immigrants from European countries ebbs. At the same time, minority populations are growing much faster, hastening a demographic shift that has been decades in the making.
The average non-Hispanic white American is 43.5 years old, according to the new data. The average Hispanic American, by contrast, is 29.3 years old.
Demographers say the decline in the white population has been coming for decades, as Americans decide to have children at later ages and as the baby-boom generation moves toward retirement. Today, there are fewer white women in prime childbearing years as a share of the overall population than ever before, and more minorities in childbearing years than ever before.
“White fertility has gone down. There’s a little bit less white immigration in the last year,” said William Frey, a demographer and sociologist at the Brookings Institution in Washington. “As the white population becomes older, that means that even if fertility gets up a little bit, it’s not going to be what it was a long time ago.”"
The clock keeps ticking..as the nation's demographics inexorably change.
"The number of non-Hispanic white people in the United States decreased for the first time in the nation’s history between 2015 and 2016, according to new figures released Thursday by the U.S. Census Bureau.
The data show the nation’s white population is aging rapidly, as Americans delay their decision to have a family and as the flow of foreign immigrants from European countries ebbs. At the same time, minority populations are growing much faster, hastening a demographic shift that has been decades in the making.
The average non-Hispanic white American is 43.5 years old, according to the new data. The average Hispanic American, by contrast, is 29.3 years old.
Demographers say the decline in the white population has been coming for decades, as Americans decide to have children at later ages and as the baby-boom generation moves toward retirement. Today, there are fewer white women in prime childbearing years as a share of the overall population than ever before, and more minorities in childbearing years than ever before.
“White fertility has gone down. There’s a little bit less white immigration in the last year,” said William Frey, a demographer and sociologist at the Brookings Institution in Washington. “As the white population becomes older, that means that even if fertility gets up a little bit, it’s not going to be what it was a long time ago.”"
