300 Million – Another tick of the US population clock

October 18th, 2006

According to the US Census Bureau, on October 17, 2006 the US population reached the landmark level of 300 million. As monumental as that moment was, it represented a missed opportunity to point out a number of important yet complex trends playing out within the US population in favor of a simple, unimportant one. While the change in the overall population (the growth rate) is remarkably unremarkable, the change in the composition of the population is anything but that.

The simple facts are, the US population was estimated at about 296.5 million in 2005 and has been growing at just over 1% per year since 1990 (US Census Data, Lafayette Associates Analysis). To be sure the current population growth rate is on a strong up-trend, having risen in each of the past 19 years. In 2006, the population is expected to grow 1.23%, which would be the highest rate since 1971.

Putting that rate in a historical context, however, reveals that since 1900, the US population has grown 1.27% on average, so the 2006 rate would again seem to be unremarkable. And while it may be a stretch to compare our current situation with the turn of the 20^th century, as recently as the Baby Boom birth years of the late 1950’s, those rates were about 1.7%.

Now for some of the complexities: In the case of US population growth in 2006, one might expect that all-time lows in the birth and death rates would yield a lower than average overall growth rate. That the rate was average is an indication of how the other driver of population growth – immigration – is making up the difference. Given that the population is not growing fast, historically speaking, the very high levels of immigration we have seen over the past 10 years would represent a significant change in the composition of our population.

Entry Filed under: Demographics