Majority minority in the United States
In the United States of America, majority-minority area or minority-majority area is a term describing a U.S. state or jurisdiction whose population is composed of less than 50% non-Hispanic whites. It is defined as a population with a collective majority of nationwide minorities, meaning a grouping of racial and ethnic groups that composes over 50% of the territorial population, regardless if one of those minority groups already attains a majority on its own. No single minority is yet the majority in any state, with the closest to that end being Hispanics in New Mexico. As such, all majority-minority states do not have a single ethnic or racial group as the outright majority.
Racial data is derived from self-identification questions on the U.S. census and on U.S. Census Bureau estimates.. The term is often used in voting rights law to designate voting districts that are designed under the Voting Rights Act to enable ethnic or language minorities "the opportunity to elect their candidate of choice." In that context, the term was first used by the Supreme Court in 1977. The Court had previously used the term in employment discrimination and labor relations cases.
- As of 2024, nine states are majority-minority: Hawaii, California, New Mexico, Texas, Nevada, Maryland, Georgia, Florida, and New Jersey. In the case of Hawaii, the state has never had a non-Hispanic White majority, since the historic majority population consisted of Native Hawaiians. However, according to the 2020 United States Census, the largest racial groups were Asians, non-Hispanic Whites, and individuals identifying as two or more races, each exceeding the share of Native Hawaiians, who accounted for 10.2% of the population.
- Washington, D.C., together with all of the populated United States territories—Puerto Rico, Guam, the U.S. Virgin Islands, the Northern Mariana Islands, and American Samoa—are majority-minority. None of the current U.S. territories has ever had a non-Hispanic White majority.
- As of 2011, minority births are the majority among births nationwide. Out of all Americans including Puerto Rico, the US is currently 44.2478% Minority American per 2024 ACS Data.
- As of 2017, minority children comprise the majority among children in fourteen states: the six that are already majority-minority, plus the following eight: Arizona, Florida, Georgia, New Jersey, Delaware, Alaska, New York, and Mississippi.
- As of 2024, children of non-Hispanic White origin constitute less than half—48%—of the nation’s child population.
- Per the 2020 United States Census, the percentage of non-Hispanic white residents is below 60% in eighteen states: the seven that are already majority-minority, plus the following ten: Florida, New Jersey, New York, Arizona, Mississippi, Louisiana, Alaska, Illinois, Delaware, and Virginia. Per the 2022 American Community Survey, the non-Hispanic white population declined below 50% in Georgia ; and per the 2023 American Community Survey, the non-Hispanic white population declined below 60% in North Carolina. Per the 2024 American Community Survey one-year estimates, Florida at 49.07% and New Jersey at 49.50%, have both become majority minority States.
- The whole United States of America is projected to become majority-minority by the middle of the 21st century if current trends continue. The U.S. will then become the first major post-industrial society in the world where the dominant group established in an earlier period transitioned from majority to minority under the influence of changing demographics. With alternate immigration scenarios, the whole United States is projected to become majority-minority sometime between 2041 and 2046.
States
In the same period, Georgia, Alabama, and Florida had populations that were nearly 50% black; while Maryland, North Carolina, and Virginia had black populations approaching or exceeding 40%. Texas's black population reached 30%.
The demographics of these states changed markedly from the 1890s through the 1960s, as two waves of the Great Migration resulted in more than 6,500,000 African Americans to abandon the economically depressed, segregated Deep South in search of better employment opportunities and living conditions, first in Northern and Midwestern industrial cities, and later west to California. One-fifth of Florida's black population had left the state by 1940, for instance. During the last thirty years of the twentieth century into the twenty-first century, scholars have documented a reverse New Great Migration of black people to southern states, but typically to urban destinations in the New South, which have pleasant climates and developing economies.
Washington, D.C., was one of the magnets for black people during the Great Migration, and reached a majority-black status during the migration's latter stages. The black proportion has declined since the 1990s due to gentrification and expanding opportunities elsewhere, with some leaving the district because of rising housing costs or for opportunities in the South. Many black people have moved to Maryland, Georgia, Florida, and Texas. They are joined by others migrating to jobs in states of the New South in a reverse of the Great Migration. Per the 2020 Census, the Black population represented 40.9% of the D.C. population — a considerable decline from 75% in the late-1970s. At the same time, the Asian, Hispanic, and Mixed race populations have all increased in the District, and it is still classified as a majority-minority area.
Since 1965, changes in the origin of foreign immigration have resulted in increases in the number of majority-minority areas, most notably in California. Its legal resident population was 89.5% 'non-Hispanic white' in the 1940s, but by 2020, was 34.7% 'non-Hispanic white'.
In 2010, minority children comprised the majority among children in the six states that were already majority-minority, plus the following four: Arizona, Florida, Georgia, and Mississippi.
Hawaii is the only state to have never had a non-Hispanic white majority. In addition, all populated United States territories have never had a non-Hispanic white majority.
Cities
Many cities in the United States became majority-minority by 2010. Out of the top 20 cities by population in 2020, only Indianapolis, Columbus, Denver, and Seattle retain non-Hispanic white majorities.As of 2012, 50 metropolitan areas in the U.S. are majority-minority.
As of 2015, 12% of U.S. counties are majority-minority.
Data collection
The first data for New Mexico was a 5% sample in 1940, which estimated non-Hispanic whites at 50.9%. Hispanics are not classified as a race, according to the U.S. census, but as an ethnic and cultural group of any race. Of respondents who listed Hispanic origin, some identified as being of the White race, roughly half gave responses tabulated under "Some other race", and much smaller numbers listed Black, American Indian, or Asian as their race.In U.S. censuses since 1990, self-identification by respondents has been the primary way to identify race of residents. Presumption of race based on countries or regions given in the ancestry question is used only when a respondent has answered the ancestry question but not the race question. The U.S. census defines "White people" very broadly as "people having origins in any of the original peoples of Europe, the Middle East, or North Africa, i.e. Caucasoid. This definition has changed through the years.
Although the census attempts to enumerate both citizens and non-citizens, the undocumented immigrant population of the United States has proven hard to quantify; the census uses a 12 million base estimate nationally.