More Deaths Than Births Among U.S. Whites

We already knew that minorities were growing faster in the United States than Whites, and with each passing year make up a bigger percentage of the United States population. This is due to minority Americans having a higher birth rate and a higher immigration rate (especially Hispanics). It is just a demographic fact that this will lead to the United States becoming a nation where current minorities will become the majority (and Whites will be a minority of the population).

Now there is another factor that may hasten that future reality. While Whites already had a smaller birth rate than minorities, since the Great Recession of 2007 that birth rate has dropped even lower -- and now Whites in the U.S. have more deaths than births each year. In the last couple of years, that has been offset by White immigration, but that also will soon change. Note in the chart above that Whites have an older average age than any other group. And with the baby boomers (a group composed mainly of Whites) now approaching their elderly years, that average age will get even older (lowering the birth rate and increasing the death rate).

This declining amount of Whites will combine with the increasing amount of minorities to make the time when minorities become the majority come even faster than previously predicted. Of course, this is very bad news for Republicans -- who continue to pursue anti-minority and anti-immigrant policies. Some of them realize they must change or become more of a minority with each national election, but their base of racists, teabaggers, and fundamentalists don't want to change. They still dream of a predominantly White America with White leadership -- and they have no intention of giving up that dream, even with the obvious demographic reality staring them in the face.