Whites Account for Under Half of Births in U.S.

The New York Times By SABRINA TAVERNISE Published: May 17, 2012 WASHINGTON — After years of speculation, estimates and projections, the Census Bureau has made it official: White births are no longer a majority in the United States. Non-Hispanic whites accounted for 49.6 percent of all births in the 12-month period that ended last July, according to Census Bureau data made public on Thursday, while minorities — including Hispanics, blacks, Asians and those of mixed race — reached 50.4 percent, representing a majority for the first time in the country’s history.

Full Story: http://www.nytimes.com/2012/05/17/us/whites-account-for-under-half-of-births-in-us.html?nl=todaysheadlines&emc=edit_th_20120517

Census count finds decreasing white population in 15 states

The Washington Post
By Carol Morello, Published: September 29

Non-Hispanic whites are a dwindling share of the U.S. population, with their numbers dropping in the Northeast and Midwest and growing only modestly in the South and West, the Census Bureau said Thursday.
Whites declined in 15 states, almost all in the industrial and farming states from Massachusetts to Pennsylvania, and from Kansas to Ohio. They also declined in California and three Southern states, including Maryland.

A Census Bureau analysis of the 2010 count showed that the number of non-Hispanic whites rose over the decade from 194.5 million to 197 million, but the 1.2 percent growth rate fell far short of the national increase of 9.7 percent. Non-Hispanic whites are now 64 percent of the population, down from 69 percent a decade ago.

Full Story: http://www.washingtonpost.com/local/census-count-finds-decreasing-white-population-in-15-states/2011/09/29/gIQA2aDJ8K_story.html?wpisrc=nl_cuzheads

Census Bureau Reports Nearly 6 in 10 Advanced Degree Holders

U.S. Census Bureau

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

TUESDAY, APRIL 20, 2010
Robert Bernstein
Public Information Office

Census Bureau Reports Nearly 6 in 10 Advanced Degree HoldersAge 25-29 Are Women
The U.S. Census Bureau reported today more women than men are expected to occupy professions such as doctors, lawyers and college professors as they represent approximately 58 percent of young adults, age 25 to 29, who hold an advanced degree. In addition, among all adults 25 and older, more women than men had high school diplomas and bachelor’s degrees.
The tabulations, Educational Attainment in the United States: 2009, showed that among people in the 25-29 age group, 9 percent of women and 6 percent of men held either a master’s, professional (such as law or medical) or doctoral degree. This holds true for white, black and Hispanic women. Among Asian men and women of this age group, there was no statistical difference.
The data also demonstrate the extent to which having such a degree pays off: average earnings in 2008 totaled $83,144 for those with an advanced degree, compared with $58,613 for those with a bachelor’s degree only. People whose highest level of attainment was a high school diploma had average earnings of $31,283.
Also included are data on the highest level of education achieved by a wide range of demographic and socioeconomic characteristics, including age, sex, race, Hispanic origin, marital status, household relationship, citizenship, nativity and year of entry. Historical tables provide data on mean earnings by attainment level, sex, race and Hispanic origin with data back to 1975, and tables on attainment levels back to 1940.
Sonia Collazo, a Census Bureau demographer, notes, “The attainment tabulations are the most detailed education-level data available from the Census Bureau. The data allow analysts to precisely track the education levels of the population, from the least to the most educated. In all, 15 levels are shown for detailed age groups by race and Hispanic origin.”

Full Census Bureau Release: http://www.census.gov/Press-Release/www/releases/archives/education/014731.html

Should the Census Be Asking People if They Are Negro?

Time
By Barbara Kiviat Friday, Jan. 22, 2010

Use of the word Negro to describe a black person has largely fallen out of polite conversation — except on the U.S. Census questionnaire. There, under "What is this person's race?" is an option that reads, "Black, African Am., or Negro." That has raised the ire of certain black activists and politicians as the Census Bureau gears up to mail out its once-a-decade questionnaires. The controversy has been cast by many as an instance of a tone-deaf agency not keeping up with the times. In actuality, the flash point represents a much larger theme: the often contentious way the Census both reflects and forges our evolving understanding of race.
The immediate reason the word Negro is on the Census is simple enough: in the 2000 Census, more than 56,000 people wrote in Negro to describe their identity — even though it was already on the form. Some people, it seems, still strongly identify with the term, which used to be a perfectly polite designation. To blindly delete it is to risk incorrectly counting the unknown number of (presumably older) black Americans who checked the "black" box precisely because Negro was included.

Read more: http://www.time.com/time/nation/article/0,8599,1955923,00.html#ixzz0dOLR3fux

Gender Wage Gap One Cent Closer; Household Income Rises, Poverty Rate Unchanged

US Census Bureau News
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
TUESDAY, AUG. 26, 2008, 10:10 A.M. EDT

Household Income Rises, Poverty Rate Unchanged, Number of Uninsured Down
Real median household income in the United States climbed 1.3 percent between 2006 and 2007, reaching $50,233, according to a report released today by the U.S. Census Bureau. This is the third annual increase in real median household income.
Meanwhile, the nation’s official poverty rate in 2007 was 12.5 percent, not statistically different from 2006. There were 37.3 million people in poverty in 2007, up from 36.5 million in 2006. The number of people without health insurance coverage declined from 47 million (15.8 percent) in 2006 to 45.7 million (15.3 percent) in 2007.
These findings are contained in the report Income, Poverty, and Health Insurance Coverage in the United States: 2007 [PDF]. The data were compiled from information collected in the 2008 Current Population Survey (CPS) Annual Social and Economic Supplement (ASEC). Also released today were income, poverty and earnings data from the 2007 American Community Survey (ACS) for all states and congressional districts, as well as for metropolitan areas, counties, cities and American Indian/Alaska Native areas of 65,000 population or more.
Current Population Survey (Primarily the source of national-level statistics)
The 2008 Current Population Survey Annual Social and Economic Supplement (CPS ASEC) reveals the following results for the nation:
Income
Race and Hispanic Origin (Race data refer to people reporting a single race only. Hispanics can be of any race.)
Real median income (adjusted for inflation) for black and non-Hispanic white households rose between 2006 and 2007, representing the first measured real increase in annual household income for each group since 1999.
Real median household income remained statistically unchanged for Asians and Hispanics.
Among the race groups and Hispanics, black households had the lowest median income in 2007 ($33,916). This compares to the median of $54,920 for non-Hispanic white households. Asian households had the highest median income ($66,103). The median income for Hispanic households was $38,679.
Regions
Between 2006 and 2007, real median household income rose in the Midwest ($50,277) and the South ($46,186), declined in the Northeast ($52,274) and remained statistically unchanged in the West ($54,138).
Nativity
Real median income rose for native-born households for the second year, up 1.0 percent from 2006, to $50,946. For foreign-born households whose householder was not a U.S. citizen, income dropped by 7.3 percent to $37,637. For households maintained by a naturalized U.S. citizen, median income remained statistically unchanged at $52,092.
Earnings
In 2007, the ratio of earnings of women who worked full time, year-round was 78 percent of that for corresponding men. The real median earnings of men who worked full time, year-round climbed between 2006 and 2007, from $43,460 to $45,113. For women, the corresponding increase was from $33,437 to $35,102. These increases in earnings follow three years of annual decline in real earnings for both men and women.
Income Inequality
Income inequality decreased between 2006 and 2007, as measured by shares of aggregate household income by quintiles and the Gini index. The share of aggregate income received by households in the top fifth of the income distribution declined, while the shares for the third and fourth quintiles increased. Meanwhile, the Gini index declined from 0.470 to 0.463, moving closer to 0, which represents perfect income equality (1 represents perfect inequality). [To view the entire Census Bureau release, go to: http://www.census.gov/Press-Release/www/releases/archives/income_wealth/012528.html ]

Survey Reveals Alarming Lack of Generational Workplace Interaction

Workforce Management
It doesn’t necessarily call for mentoring of younger workers by older workers, but rather collaboration on projects in which older and younger workers feel as if they’re both contributing to business goals. By Mark Larson

There won’t be a skilled-worker shortage as baby boomers retire, a recent study says, but there will be a lack of talent if there isn’t more collaboration between workforce generations than currently exists.
Atlanta-based Randstad USA’s annual 2008 World of Work survey found that the four generations now in the U.S. workforce—Generation X, Generation Y, baby boomers and "matures" (those born 1900 to 1945)—rarely interact with one another.
That lack of communication, the study found, is keeping key institutional job knowledge held by the boomer generation from filtering down to younger workers.
The isolation among workforce generations is credited to a lack of recognition of the others’ skills or work ethic. According to the Census Bureau, the Gen Y’ers in today’s workforce—born 1980 to 1988—total 79.8 million, which outnumber the baby boomers, or those who were born 1946 to 1964. Those boomers, which total 78.5 million people, are considered the keepers of the institutional job knowledge in companies across the nation.
Randstad conducted the U.S. survey in December and January among 3,494 adults, 1,295 of whom were employers and 2,199 were employees. Employees came from businesses with at least five staffers. Employers sampled were involved in human resources strategies at their companies for at least six months.
Given this scenario, businesses are faced with cultivating more interaction among generations in their workforce, says Eric Buntin, managing director of marketing and operations for Randstad. [To read the entire story, go to: http://www.workforce.com/archive/feature/25/68/23/index.php ]

In a Generation, Minorities May Be the U.S. Majority

The New York Times
August 13, 2008
By SAM ROBERTS

Ethnic and racial minorities will comprise a majority of the nation’s population in a little more than a generation, according to new Census Bureau projections, a transformation that is occurring faster than anticipated just a few years ago.
The census calculates that by 2042, Americans who identify themselves as Hispanic, black, Asian, American Indian, Native Hawaiian and Pacific Islander will together outnumber non-Hispanic whites. Four years ago, officials had projected the shift would come in 2050.
The main reason for the accelerating change is significantly higher birthrates among immigrants. Another factor is the influx of foreigners, rising from about 1.3 million annually today to more than 2 million a year by midcentury, according to projections based on current immigration policies.
“No other country has experienced such rapid racial and ethnic change,” said Mark Mather, a demographer with the Population Reference Bureau, a research organization in Washington.
The latest figures, which are being released on Thursday, are predicated on current and historical trends, which can be thrown awry by several variables, including prospective overhauls of immigration policies and sudden increases in refugees.
A decade ago, census demographers estimated that the nation’s population, which topped 300 million in 2006, would not surpass 400 million until sometime after midcentury. Now, they are projecting that the population will top 400 million in 2039 and reach 439 million in 2050.
So-called minorities, the Census Bureau projects, will constitute a majority of the nation’s children under 18 by 2023 and of working-age Americans by 2039.
For the first time, both the number and the proportion of non-Hispanic whites, who now account for 66 percent of the population, will decline, starting around 2030. By 2050, their share will dip to 46 percent.
Higher mortality rates among older native-born white Americans and higher birthrates rates among immigrants and their children are already driving ethnic and racial disparities.
“A momentum is built into this as a result of past immigration,” said Jeffrey S. Passel, senior demographer at the Pew Hispanic Center. “In the 1970s, ’80s and ’90s, there were more Hispanic immigrants than births. This decade, there are more births than immigrants. Almost regardless of what you assume about future immigration, the country will be more Hispanic and Asian.”
With the Census Bureau forecasting even more immigrants, other demographers estimate that the proportion of foreign-born Americans, now about 12 percent, could surpass the 1910 historic high of nearly 15 percent by about 2025 and may approach 20 percent in 2050.
According to the new forecast, by 2050, the number of Hispanic people will nearly triple, to 133 million from 47 million, to account for 30 percent of Americans, compared with 15 percent today.
People who say they are Asian, with their ranks soaring to 41 million from 16 million, will make up more than 9 percent of the population, up from 5 percent.
More than three times as many people are expected to identify themselves as multiracial — 16 million, accounting for nearly 4 percent of the population.
The population of people who define themselves a black is projected to rise to 66 million from 41 million, but increase its overall share by barely two percentage points, to 15 percent. [To read the entire story, go to: http://www.nytimes.com/2008/08/14/washington/14census.html?_r=1&th=&oref=slogin&emc=th&pagewanted=all ]