Hispanics Account for 1/2 of U.S. Population Growth

The Associated Press

WASHINGTON - One of every seven people in the United States is Hispanic, a record number that probably will keep rising because of immigration and a birth rate outstripping non-Hispanic blacks and whites.

The country's largest minority group accounted for one-half of the overall population growth of 2.9 million between July 2003 and July 2004, according to a Census Bureau report being released today.

The agency estimated there are 41.3 million Hispanics in the United States. The bureau does not ask people about their legal status; that number includes both legal and other residents.

The Hispanic growth rate for the 12 months starting July 2003 was 3.6 percent compared with the overall population growth of 1 percent.

The population growth for Asians ran a close second. Increases in both groups are due largely to immigration, but also higher birth rates, said Lewis W. Goodman, an American University expert on U.S.-Latin American relations.

"If we didn't have those elements, we would be moving into a situation like Japan and Europe . . . where the populations are graying in a way that is very alarming and endangering their productivity and endangering even their social security systems," he said.

"Looking toward the future, we see a different face of the U.S. population," said Audrey Singer, an immigration and census specialist at the Brookings Institution. "But I don't think that's necessarily new. It's a confirmation that this hasn't stopped or changed much."

The size of the Hispanic and Asian populations rose in nearly every state during the 1990s. Also, the Census Bureau projected last year that whites and minorities would be roughly equal in number by 2050.

"Sometimes this is portrayed as a problem for the United States - that the ethnic composition of the country is changing and that new people are coming to take jobs," Goodman said.

"My view is just the opposite: increased fertility of young people makes the (social) structure one that is more sustaining of economic production and enables older people to be in a culture where their retirements can be financed."

The Census Bureau estimates population change using annual data on births, deaths and international migration.