California Hispanic population outstrips white: Census

[July 09, 2015]  SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) - California's Hispanic population now outnumbers the white population, U.S. Census data shows, marking a long-predicted shift in the country's most populous state.

Census population estimates released late last month showed that as of July 1, 2014, the state was home to roughly 14.99 million Hispanic residents compared to 14.92 million non-Hispanic white residents.

The shift makes California the third U.S. state to not have a white plurality, following New Mexico with its large Hispanic population and the predominantly Asian Hawaii.

The trend is occurring alongside nationwide growth in the Hispanic population, which increased to about 17 percent of the total as of last July from around 12.5 percent in 2000, according to U.S. Census figures.

In California, the median age of Hispanic residents was 29 years old, much lower than the median age of around 45 years old for non-Hispanic whites, Census data showed.

Demographers and state officials have predicted for years that California Hispanics would begin to outstrip the white population for the first time since statehood between 2014 and 2015.

Data released by the California Department of Finance last December forecast the trend to continue, with the Hispanic population expected to be nearly double that of non-Hispanic whites in the state by 2060.

"This is sort of the official statistical recognition of something that has been underway for almost an entire generation," Roberto Suro, director of the Tomás Rivera Policy Institute at USC, told the Los Angeles Times on Wednesday. "It is going to accelerate."

The Pew Research Center said in May that the U.S.-born Hispanic population has been driving the nationwide increase with immigration stalling over the last decade.

(Reporting by Curtis Skinner; Editing by Sandra Maler)

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