More Minorities than Whites Having Babies in the US - East Idaho News
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More Minorities than Whites Having Babies in the US

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GETTY N 051712 Babies?  SQUARESPACE CACHEVERSION=1337244308678Comstock Images/Thinkstock(WASHINGTON) — For the first time since it began keeping records, the Census Bureau reported on Thursday that more babies are being born collectively to Hispanics, blacks, Asians and those of mixed races than to white families.

During the 12-month period that ended in July 2011, births of minority babies reached 50.4 percent compared to 49.6 percent for non-Hispanic whites.

It’s expected that whites will remain the majority until mid-century.  However, William H. Frey, the senior demographer at the Brookings Institution, described the ongoing shift to The New York Times as a “transformation from a mostly white baby boomer culture to the more globalized multiethnic country that we are becoming.”

Census Bureau figures reveal there are nearly 350 U.S. counties in which whites are no longer in the majority.  Minorities have become the majority in four states and the District of Columbia, as well as large metro areas that include New York, Las Vegas and Memphis.

This changing face of the nation has already started a generational divide, with young minorities on one side and older white people on the other.

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