On May 1st, 2008, the US Census Bureau released new figures related to minorities. The nation’s Hispanic population increased 1.4 million to reach 45.5 million on July 1, 2007, or 15.1 percent of the estimated total U.S. population of 301.6 million.
While Hispanics remained the largest minority group, with blacks (single race or multiracial) second at 40.7 million in 2007, it seems that the Hispanic population is still more concentrated in some areas: National and state estimates by race, origin, sex and age also show that the Hispanic population exceeded 500,000 in 16 states; the black population exceeded 500,000 in 20 states. Blacks were the largest minority group in 24 states, compared with 20 states in which Hispanics were the largest minority group.
With a 3.3 percent increase between July 1, 2006, and July 1, 2007, Hispanics were the fastest-growing minority group. Asians were the second fastest-growing minority group, with a 2.9 percent population increase during the period. The white population grew by 0.3 percent during the one-year period.
Overall, the nation’s minority population reached 102.5 million in 2007 — 34 percent of the total. California had a minority population of 20.9 million — 20 percent of the nation’s total, Texas had a minority population of 12.5 million — 12 percent of the U.S. total.
Four states and the District of Columbia were “majority-minority” (i.e., more than 50 percent of their population is made up of people other than single-race non-Hispanic whites). Hawaii led the nation with a population that was 75 percent minority in 2007, followed by the District of Columbia (68 percent), New Mexico (58 percent), California (57 percent) and Texas (52 percent). Next in line, though not majority-minority, were Nevada, Maryland and Georgia, each with a minority population of 42 percent
Some other highlights about the Hispanic population:
* California (13.2 million) had the largest Hispanic population of any state as of July 1, 2007, followed by Texas (8.6 million) and Florida (3.8 million). Texas had the largest numerical increase between 2006 and 2007 (308,000), followed by California (268,000) and Florida (131,000). In New Mexico, Hispanics comprised the highest proportion of the total population (44 percent), with California and Texas (36 percent each) next in line.
* The Hispanic population in 2007 had a median age of 27.6, compared with the population as a whole at 36.6. Almost 34 percent of the Hispanic population was younger than 18, compared with 25 percent of the total population.
