Third state in the US to have a non-White majority.
By Raif Karerat
WASHINGTON, DC: In a long predicted shift in demographics, Latinos have surpassed whites as the largest ethnic group in California.
According to census figures released last month, California’s Latinos numbered 14.99 million by July 1, 2014, putting them ahead of the state’s 14.92 million non-Hispanic whites.
“This is sort of the official statistical recognition of something that has been underway for almost an entire generation,” Roberto Suro, director of the Tomás Rivera Policy Institute at the University of Southern California, told the Los Angeles Times on Wednesday.
California joins New Mexico as the second state with a Latino plurality. Hawaii, with its large Asian population, is the third state where whites are not the largest ethnic group, according to the Associated Press.
Demographers originally expected California to reach its milestone in 2013, or even earlier, but slowing birth rates delayed the date.
“Los Angeles had the largest Hispanic population of any county (4.9 million) in 2014 while Harris, Texas, had the largest numeric increase since 2013 (45,000),” said a census press release. Starr – on the Mexican border in Texas – had the highest share of Hispanics (95.8 percent).
The same Census report revealed in late June that racial and ethnic “minority” children are now the majority.
The report noted that Millennials — who now represent more than a quarter of the population, surpassing the 75.4 million Baby Boomers who are still alive — are more diverse than earlier generations as 44.2 percent are non-Caucasian.
Yet another Census report from March of this year predicted that by 2044 more than half of the population in the United States would be part of a “minority” group.