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DEMOGRAPHICS OF THE UNITED STATES
On October 17, 2006, the United States population was estimated by the U.S.
Census Bureau to be 300,000,000. The U.S. population included an estimated 12
million unauthorized migrants, of whom an estimated 1 million were uncounted by
the Census Bureau. The overall growth rate is 0.89%, compared to 0.16% in the
European Union. The birth rate of 14.16 per 1,000 is 30% below the world
average, while higher than any European country except for Albania and Ireland.
In 2006, 1.27 million immigrants were granted legal residence. Mexico has been
the leading source of new U.S. residents for over two decades; since 1998,
China, India, and the Philippines have been in the top four sending countries
every year. The United States is the only industrialized nation in which large
population increases are projected.
| Race/Ethnicity (2005) |
|
White |
73.9% |
|
African American |
12.4% |
|
Asian |
4.4% |
|
Native American and Alaskan Native |
0.8% |
|
Native Hawaiian and Pacific Islander |
0.1% |
| Other/multiracial |
8.3% |
|
Hispanic or Latino (of any race) |
14.8% |
The United States has a very diverse population—thirty-one ancestry groups
have more than a million members. Whites are the largest racial group, with
German Americans, Irish Americans, and English Americans constituting three of
the country's four largest ancestry groups. African Americans, mostly
descendants of former slaves, constitute the nation's largest racial minority
and third largest ancestry group. Asian Americans are the country's second
largest racial minority; the two largest Asian American ancestry groups are
Chinese and Filipino. In 2005, the U.S. population included an estimated 4.5
million people with some Native American or Alaskan native ancestry (2.4 million
exclusively of such ancestry) and nearly 1 million with some native Hawaiian or
Pacific island ancestry (0.4 million exclusively).
Hispanic American population growth is a major demographic trend. The
approximately 44 million Americans of Hispanic descent constitute the largest
ethnic minority in the country. About 64% of Hispanic Americans are of Mexican
descent. Between 2000 and 2004, the country's Hispanic population increased 14%
while the non-Hispanic population rose just 2%. Much of this growth is from
immigration: As of 2004, 12% of the U.S. population was foreign-born, over half
that number from Latin America. Fertility is also a factor: The average Hispanic
woman gives birth to three children in her lifetime. The comparable fertility
rate is 2.2 for non-Hispanic black women and 1.8 for non-Hispanic white women
(below the replacement rate of 2.1). Hispanics accounted for nearly half of the
national population growth of 2.9 million between July 2005 and July 2006. It is
estimated on the basis of current trends that by 2050 whites of non-Hispanic
origin will be 50.1% of the U.S. population, compared to 69.4% in 2000. They are
currently less than half the population in four "majority-minority
states"—California, New Mexico, Hawaii, and Texas—as well as the District of
Columbia.
About 83% of the population lives in one of the country's 363 metropolitan
areas. In 2005, 254 incorporated places in the United States had populations
over 100,000, nine cities had more than 1 million residents, and four global
cities had over 2 million (New York City, Los Angeles, Chicago, and Houston).
The United States has fifty metropolitan areas with populations greater than 1
million. Of the fifty fastest-growing metro areas, twenty-three are in the West
and twenty-five in the South. Among the country's twenty most populous metro
areas, those of Dallas (the fourth largest), Houston (sixth), and Atlanta
(ninth) saw the largest numerical gains between 2000 and 2006, while that of
Phoenix (thirteenth) grew the largest in percentage terms.
| Five most populous incorporated places in the United States
(2006) |
| Rank |
City |
Population
within
city limits |
Metropolitan
Area |
Region |
| population |
rank |
| 1 |
New York City |
8,214,426 |
18,818,536 |
1 |
Northeast |
| 2 |
Los Angeles |
3,849,378 |
12,950,129 |
2 |
West |
| 3 |
Chicago |
2,833,321 |
9,505,748 |
3 |
Midwest |
| 4 |
Houston |
2,144,491 |
5,539,949 |
6 |
South |
| 5 |
Phoenix |
1,512,986 |
4,039,182 |
13 |
West |
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