The Census Bureau predicts that the white population in the United States will dip below half of the national total by 2042. The Bureau's previous estimate was that whites would lose their majority status in 2050, a sign that the growth of minority populations in the U.S. is speeding up.
Previously, the Yonder listed and mapped the rural and exurban counties where minorities constituted a majority of the population, and those places where minorities are soon to become the majority. This week, we examine the rural counties where minorities are the majority among residents under age 20.
The Yonder has pulled out those rural and exurban counties where minorities under the age of 20 constitute a majority of the youth population.
We list the counties where minorities under 20 years of age constitute between 40 and 50 percent of the youth population and counties where that minority youth population group has grown by at least 2.5 percent since 2000. We labeled these counties as "tipping," since their minority youth will soon become the majority.
The map above the lists below show the rural and exurban counties where minorities are a majority of the youth population. Green counties have Hispanic majorities. Orange counties have black majorities. Pinkish counties have majorities of Native American youth. Blue counties are bi-racial and red counties are tri-racial.
Find your state and county here (there are no counties with minority-majority youth in the East region):
South
Midwest
West
In many of these counties, young white populations are shrinking, due to outmigration or low birth rates. In fact, youth populations in many of these counties declined among all racial groups.
The change in the structure of populations will affect politics, according to Brookings Institution demographer Bill Frey. "Whites, and states where whites dominate the population, will be much more concerned about issues affecting health care and retirement security," Frey wrote. "Hispanics, and areas where they are large voting blocs, will be more interested in education, family and child-friendly policies."