The Demographic Characteristics of the Negro Population in the United States

Abstract

The Negro population of the United States is than the white population. Approximately one-half of all Negroes are under 26.1 years of age, whereas the younger half of the white population includes persons up to 30.2 years (difference 3.9 years). The former of these figures is the median of the non-white population according to the 1950 census; but in previous census returns the non-white median age was practically identical with the Negro median age and we can assume that this is still true. Referring again to this heterogeneous classification used by the census to simplify its tabulations at the cost of providing confused information, it is apparent that both the white and non-white classes of our national population have become constantly older. The absolute differences in median ages between the two classes have remained fairly constant for a long time. In 1880, the median ages were: nonwhite 18.0years; white 21 .4 years difference 3.4 years). The age composition of any population at a particular time is the result of three previous conditions: (1) mortality, as it affects proportions surviving from birth to successive ages, (2) migration, and the age distribution of migrants, and (3) rate of growth, due to excess of births over deaths, as it affects the size of birth cohorts at different times. The last consideration, which is often neglected, can be clarified by a simple observation. Persons in their eighties in the United States today are fewer than those in their forties, in part because only about half as many babies were born during the 1870's as in the larger population during the 1910's. The younger age structure of the non-white population, relative to that of the white population of the United States is, therefore, all the more striking because the slower growth of the former prior to 1930 exerted an influence in the opposite direction. The observed effect is evidence of the combined force of the other two factors affecting age composition: immigration, largely restricted to white migrants, and differential mortality. The trend toward the aging of all racial classes can be attributed both to the slowing down of population growth and to increases in longevity. The precise analysis of the changing influence of these diverse factors on the age composition of different racial classes in our population is a complex task which has not been undertaken by the present writers. Nevertheless, we feel warranted in asserting that further decreases in mortality in all elements of the population, and a further narrowing of the differential in mortality between Negroes and whites will tend to bring about the further aging of both elements and a gradual narrowing of their differences in age structure. Actually differences in age composition between the Negro and white sec-