EthnicMajority

(Examiner.com) A large—and growing––segment of the Southern California population is of Mexican origin. According to a report released July 14, 2011 by the Pew Hispanic Center , the fast-growing population in the U.S. of people of Mexican origin increased far more in the last decade from births than from immigration from Mexico. The report noted that following one of the largest mass migrations in modern history, which brought more than 10 million Mexicans to live in the U.S. from 1970 to 2007, the number of immigrants arriving fell off sharply in recent years. During that period, a majority of the Mexican immigrants who settled here are young and in their childbearing years; thus, this population growth encompasses women’s healthcare. The report found that from 2000 to 2010, about 7.2 million infants of Mexican origin were born in the U.S. while 4.2 million new immigrants arrived from Mexico.

About 31.8 million people of Mexican origin now comprise 10% of the U.S. population; this group also represents and nearly two-thirds of all Hispanics in the nation. “The immigration of the last decades built up a relatively young population that is having births,” said Jeffrey S. Passel, senior demographer at the Pew Hispanic Center, an author of the report. The figures, which are based on recent census data from the United States and Mexico, include Mexican-born immigrants living in this country and Hispanic Americans who trace their ancestry to Mexico.

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(Ethnicmajority, Clifford Tong) Last week a study was published by the University of Michigan Institute for Social Research showing one in five American moms had children with more than one birth father. This type of family structure is even more common among minority women: 59% for African American, and 35% for Hispanic mothers.

While one might think this is attributed to teenage unwed mothers having boatloads of kids before they reach voting age, the data show that this is not the case. 43% of the women who had kids with multiple fathers were married at the time they had their first child. This is indicative that many of these families are the by-product of divorce, not unwed mothers.

Although this is relatively new research and some of the results seem inconclusive, I’m ready to jump to some conclusions. I think it is pretty clear that women have generally waited longer to get married and have children, for a variety of reasons. And although divorce rates are high, children of divorce should have a better chance at a stable household given that their parents are more likely to be mature and financially viable enough to provide it. So I think this age trend is pushing the statistics down, not up.

That means that the data, and more importantly the impact on the children, is still heavily skewed toward mothers who are young, unwed, uneducated, low income, and minority. Given these characteristics, there are many geographical areas where this is the cultural norm, where having a baby is viewed as a short-term status symbol rather than the life commitment and challenge that it is.

Whatever we’re doing to educate our young people about teenage pregnancy, it’s not working. This sounds like a cultural norm that is an epidemic.

(Ethnicmajority, Clifford Tong) The new 2010 census shows significant population growth in both the Hispanic and Asian communities, but this is only part of the story. The Hispanic population has reached 50 million, one out of every six Americans. What is interesting is where that growth is occurring – in the rural areas. Hispanics in North Carolina rose 111% over the last decade, for instance. African Americans are also moving in droves out of cities to suburban and rural communities.

And yet Hispanics continue to be under-represented in politics, boardrooms, media, etc. while being hammered on the immigration front. But the challenges aren’t just political. Consumers tend to speak with their wallets. I found it very interesting that all of the best selling baseball jerseys are for white players, despite the fact that the sports’ best players are Latino.

Mainstream America may be diverse in numbers, but not in attitude. The UCLA student’s YouTube video rant against Asian Americans is just the latest example debunking President Obama’s ideal that we are “one America”.

But significant challenges face the Hispanic community today. Less than half earn high school degrees and one in eight graduate from college. According to the National Campaign to Prevent Teen and Unplanned Preganancy, 52 percent of Latina teens get pregnant at least once before age 20.

In the meantime, Hispanics continue to be made a scapegoat for the economic recession by Republicans trying to make illegal immigration a political wedge issue. That can work as long as Hispanics face the aforementioned challenges and lack the political and economic clout to fight back. You have to be encouraged by the battle over union collective bargaining in Wisconsin, which showed that Americans are increasing rejecting political battles to encourage class or race warfare. These are issues for all Americans, not just some Americans.

(AsianWeek) The Asian American Advertising Federation (3AF), a leading authority on Asian American marketing and advertising, in conjunction with LA 18 KSCI-TV (LA 18), announced today some astonishing statistics about the growth of Asians in the United States. The information is based on the 2010 U.S. Census Redistricting Data.

With data reported from 27 states (or a little more than half of the state-level data at the time of reporting), the Asian population is already seeing significant growth that far outpaces the total United States population by huge margins. All 27 states showed double or even triple-digit growth in their Asian populations. The top five states with the highest increases in the Asian population compared to ten years ago are: Nevada, up 116 percent; North Carolina, up 85 percent; Delaware up 78 percent; Arkansas, up 77 percent; and Indiana up 74 percent.

Among the 27 states with their local-level data released so far, the top 10 states with the highest number of Asians (in order from highest to lowest) are California; Texas; New Jersey; Hawaii; Illinois; Washington; Virginia; Maryland; North Carolina, and Nevada.

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(USA Today) Hispanics from states with large and established Latino populations increasingly identified themselves by race — most chose white — rather than the murky “Some Other Race” that many picked a decade before, a USA TODAY analysis of 2010 Census data finds.

The shift is important because having Hispanics pick one of the recognized race categories — white, black, Asian/Pacific Islander, American Indian/Alaska Native — provides a more exact racial breakdown of the nation’s population.

It also is a sign that the fastest-growing and largest minority population in the United States is adjusting to the way Americans categorize race, some demographers say. If anything, it’s an indication that they are at least figuring out that the government doesn’t recognize “Hispanic” as a race, but as an ethnicity.

“I don’t know if it’s assimilation or just learning,” says Jeffrey Passel, a demographer at the Pew Hispanic Center.

Census forms ask people who identify themselves as Hispanic to also check what race they are. There are Hispanic whites, Hispanic blacks, Hispanic Asians and so on. Those who don’t identify with existing race categories can pick “Some Other Race.”

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(Mail Online) America’s population centre is edging away from the Midwest to the south west, pulled by shifting Hispanic growth, according to the latest census figures.

The historic movement is changing the nation’s politics and even the traditional notion of the country’s heartland – long the symbol of mainstream American beliefs and culture.

The West is now home to the four fastest-growing states – Nevada, Arizona, Utah and Idaho – and has passed the Midwest in population.

When California and Texas are added to the south-western population shift, these states make up more than a quarter of the nation’s total gains since 2000.
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The Census Bureau is expected to announce a new mean centre of population next month in or around Texas County, Missouri, south-west of where it is now in Phelps County.

According to the 2010 figures, if the trend continues, the centre would leave the state by 2050 for the first time since 1980.

Robert Lang, a sociology professor at the University of Nevada-Las Vegas, said:’The geography is clearly shifting, with the West beginning to emerge as America’s new heartland.’

Professor Lang, who regularly crunches data to determine the nation’s centre, added: ‘It’s a pace-setting region that is dominant in population growth but also as a swing point in American politics.’

The last time it fell outside the Midwest was1850, in the eastern territory now known as West Virginia.

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(Portada) Jacqueline Hernandez, Chief Operating Officer of Telemundo Communications (photo), gave an interesting presentation this morning at New York’s Paley Center.

Hernandez presented the results of “GenYLA”, a new research study conducted by the Telemundo Communications Group, on the current state of Young Latino Americans (YLAS), ages 18-34, one of the fastest growing and increasingly important segments of the population, especially for marketers.
The study analyzes the State of Young Latino Americans (YLA’s) , defined as 18-34 year olds, whose country of origin is in Latin America and who live in the U.S. Hernandez noted that these three terms can be used interchangeably as they are the basis of the Identity of Young Latino Americans. The results of the study are valuable input to create Telemundo programming, particularly for the Mun2 Cable TV Network, and other content that reflects the Hispanic experience in a language that speaks to YLA’s.

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(Afro) Black residents are increasingly departing large U.S. cities a shift that could affect African-American political power according to data from the first results of the U.S. Census Bureau’s population census.

The population of the nation’s capital now exceeds 600,000 residents, 53 percent of whom are African American, and there has been a gain of nearly 30,000 new Washingtonians since a decade ago. But, according to Census Bureau data released Dec. 21 and cited by The Washington Post, much of the increase is due to an ongoing influx of Hispanics and Whites moving into the city—a change brought on by a gentrification process that has forced many African-Americans out of city neighborhoods.

According to the Post, Blacks in D.C. face the prospect of being a population minority in the city by the time of the next census in 2020.

In New York, the number of Blacks leaving the city has exceeded the departure of Whites since 2000, and as a result, that city has now suffered an overall decline in Black population for the first time in history, according to GBM News.

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(CNN) Each election cycle is dubbed “the year” — a time when Latinos will show up at the polls in droves and transform the political landscape.

President Obama’s renewed push last week for immigration reform has brought with it fresh expectations for the Latino vote in November’s midterm elections.

The issue is considered one of symbolic and substantive importance for the community. Four out of five undocumented immigrants are from Mexico or another part of Latin America, according to the Pew Hispanic Center.

While voter turnout among the Latino community has risen in recent years, the adage that there’s “strength in numbers” has yet to manifest itself.

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(CNN) According to a recent report by the Pew Research Center, one of every seven new marriages in 2008 was interracial or interethnic — the highest percentage in U.S. history. The media and blogosphere have been atwitter.

Finally, it seems, we have tangible evidence of America’s entry into a new post-racial society, proof of growing racial tolerance. Intermarriage trends are being celebrated as a positive sign that we have come to think of all Americans as, well, Americans.

But others have an entirely different take — a more ominous one. They see increasing interracial marriage rates as proof that the country is amalgamating racially.

To them, intermarriage is a putative threat to whites and America’s essential character. Their concerns are heightened by recent Census Bureau projections that the U.S. will become a majority-minority society by the middle of the century.

My research with Ken Johnson, a demographer at the University of New Hampshire, indicates that for American’s youngest residents, that future is now. Nearly half of U.S. births today are to minority women.

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