WASHINGTON — In a first, America’s racial and ethnic minorities now make up about half of the under-5 age group, reflecting sweeping changes by race and class among young people.
Due to an aging population, non-Latino whites last year recorded more deaths than births.
These two milestones, revealed in 2012 census estimates released Thursday, are the latest signs of a historic shift in which whites will become a minority within a generation, by 2043. They come after the Census Bureau reported last year that whites had fallen to a minority among newborns.
The census numbers show:
• The population younger than 5 stood at 49.9 percent minority in 2012.
• The non-white population increased by 1.9 percent to 116 million, or 37 percent. Latinos make up 17 percent of the U.S.; blacks, 12.3 percent; Asians, 5 percent; and multiracial Americans, 2.4 percent.
• Among the under-5 age group, 22 percent live in poverty, typically in more rural states such as Mississippi, Arkansas and Louisiana.
