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1. Applied Demography
An Introduction to Basic Concepts, Methods, and Data
Steve H. Murdock
David R. Ellis
www.routledge.com an informa business
ISBN 978-0-367-01259-5
Applied
Demography
Steve
H.
Murdock
and
David
R.
Ellis
9780367012595.indd 1 10/21/2018 2:26:07 PM

2. Applied Demography

4. Applied Demography
An Introduction to
Basic Concepts, Methods, and Data
Steve H. Murdock
and David R. Ellis
~l Routledge
::S~ TaylorFram Croup
AND TORK

5. Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Murdock, Steven H.
Applied demography : an introduction to basic concepts, methods,
and data / by Steve H. Murdock and David R. Ellis.
p. cm. ·
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 0-8133-8372-2
1. Demography. I. Ellis, David R. (David Rennie), 1953-
11. Title.
HB849.4.M87 1991
304.6-dc20 91-35208
CIP
ISBN 13: 978-0-367-01259-5 (hbk)
First published 1991 by Westview Press
Published 2018 by Routledge
52 Vanderbilt Avenue, New York, NY 10017
2 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon OX14 4RN
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilised in any form or
by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including
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Notice:
Product or corporate names may be trademarks or registered trademarks, and are used only for
identification and explanation without intent to infringe.
Copyright © 1991 by Taylor Francis
Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor Francis Group, an informa business

6. To Joann and Roger
June and Lee
Marijane and Bo

8. Contents
Ust of Tables and Figures
Preface
Acknowledgments
1
2
Introduction
Rationale and Background, 1
Definition and the Dimensions of
Applied Demography, 3
Organization of the Text, 8
Limitations of the Book, 9
Demographic Concepts and Trends: The Conceptual
Base and Recent Patterns of Demographic Change
Defining Key Concepts and Terms, 11
An Overview of Major Demographic
Trends in the United States, 26
Summary, 66
Conclusions, 67
3 The Materials of Appliecl Demographic Analyses:
4
Data Sources and Principles of Data Use
Indices for Locating Secondary Data, 70
Federal and State Data Compilations, 75
Federal Data Sources, 79
State Data Sources, 100
Nongovernmental Data Sources, 103
Using Secondary Data, 105
Summary and Conclusions, 112
Basic Methods and Measures of
Applied Demography
General Measures, 113
Measures of the Major Demographic
Processes and Variables, 120
Selected Methods for Controlling the Effects
of Demographic Change and Characteristics, 156
Conclusions, 174
ix
xv
xix
1
11
69
113

9. viii
5
6
Methods for Estimating and Projecting
Populations
Basic Definitions and Concepts, Principles and
Limitations, and General Procedures for Use
in Population Estimation and Projection, 176
Methods of Population Estimation, 181
Methods of Population Projection, 210
Estimates and Projections of Population-Based
Statuses and Characteristics, 234
Evaluation of Population Estimates and
Projections, 241
Conclusions, 248
Summary and Conclusions: The Future of
Population Change and Applied Demography
in the United States
Future Demographic Trends Impacting Products
and Services, 250
The Future of Applied Demography, 265
Conclusions, 273
References
Index
175
249
275
289

10. Tables and Figures
Tables
2.1 Total Resident Population and Percent Population
Change in the United States, 1790-1990 27
2.2 Components of Population Change for the United
States, 1940-1990 29
2.3 Birth, Death, and Net Migration Measures for
the United States, 1940-1990 30
2.4 Age-Specific Birth, Death, and Migration
Rates in the United States for Selected Years 31
2.5 Population of the United States, Regions,
Divisions, and States, 1900-1990 33
2.6 Population Change in the United States,
Regions and Divisions, 1960-1990 37
2.7 Population and Percentage of Population in the
United States by Urban, Rural, Rural Farm, and
Rural Nonfarm Residence, 1930-1980 39
2.8 Proportion of U.S. Population that Is
Metropolitan and Nonmetropolitan, 1950-1990 40
2.9 Median Age and the Sex Ratio in the United
States, 1900-1990 41
2.10 Population of the United States by Age and Sex,
1940-1989 42
2.11 Percent of the Population by Age Groups in the
United States, 1940-1989 45
2.12 U.S. Population, 1970, 1980, and 1990, Percent
Change in Population 1970 to 1980 and
1980 to 1990, and Proportion of Population
1970, 1980, and 1990 by Race, Hispanic
Origin, and Ethnicity 47
2.13 Percent Distribution of the Resident Population
of the United States by Regions and for the
Ten Largest States by Race and Hispanic
Origin, 1990 48
2.14 Percent Distribution of the Resident Population
of the United States, Regions and States
by Race and Hispanic Origin, 1990 49

11. x
2.15 Demographic and Socioeconomic Characteristics
of the Population of the United States by
Race/Ethnicity for Selected Years 53
2.16 Marital Status of the Population of the United
States, 1970-1988 56
2.17 Households in the United States by Type,
1970-1990 57
2.18 Estimates of Cohabitation and Marriage Before
the Age of 25 by Age Cohort in 1988 58
2.19 Number and Percent of Households by Persons
in the Household and Average Household
Size for the United States, 1940-1990 59
2.20 Selected Socioeconomic Characteristics of
the Population of the United States,
1940-1988 61
4.1 A Decomposition of the Projected Difference
in the Rate of Participation in Different
Recreational Activities Among Residents of
the United States by Activity, 1990-2000 and
2000-2025 165
4.2 A Decomposition of the Projected Difference
in the Rates of Participation in Different
Recreational Activities Among Residents of
Texas by Activity, 1990-2000 and 2000-2025 166
4.3 Components of a Working Life Table Derived
Using a Standard Life Table 173
6.1 Historical and Projected Population Growth
in the United States by Race and Spanish
Origin, 1950-2050 252
6.2 Percent of Population by Race and Spanish
Origin in the United States, 1950-2050 253
6.3 Projections of the Percent of the U.S.
Population by Age and Race/Ethnicity for
Selected Years, 1990-2050 254
6.4 Three Alternative Projections of the U.S.
Civilian Labor Force by Selected
Characteristics for 2000 256

12. xi
6.5 Projections of the Number of Persons in the
Labor Force in the United States by
Race/Ethnicity, 1986-2025 257
6.6 Projections of the Number of Residents
Enrolled in Higher Education in the
United States by Race/Ethnicity, 1986-
2025 259
6.7 Median U.S. Household Income in 1989 by
Selected Characteristics 264
Figures
3.1 Short-Form (100% Items) and Long-Form
(Sample Items) Topics in the 1990 Census
of Population and Housing 83
3.2 Publications of the 1990 Census of
Population and Housing 84
3.3 Computerized Products from the 1990 Census 88
4.1 Percentage Change in Population 114
4.2 Crude Rates 116
4.3 General Rates 118
4.4 Specific Rates 119
4.5 Arithmetic Rate of Change 121
4.6 Geometric Rate of Change 122
4.7 Exponential Rate of Change 123
4.8 Child-Woman Ratio (CWR) 125
4.9 Total Fertility Rate (TFR) · 127
4.10 Selected Measures of Infant Mortality 128
4.11 Abridged Life Table for the Male Population
of a Hypothetical Area, 1990 130
4.12 Elements of a Life Table 131
4.13 Life Table Survival Rates 135
4.14 Procedure for Computing Survival Rates for
Multi-Age Age Groups from a Life Table
for Single-Year Age Groups 136
4.15 Procedure for Computing Beginning and
Terminal Age Survival Rates 137
4.16 Migration Rates 139
4.17 Net Migration Rate (NMR) 139
4.18 Residual Migration 140

13. xii
4.19 Population Density 140
4.20 Population Potential Measure with an Example
of Its Application for a Hypothetical Set
of Areas 143
4.21 Distribution of a Hypothetical Population
by Size of Place Category and the Related
Lorenz Curve 144
4.22 The Cini Coefficient and Index of
Dissimilarity Measures of Population
Distribution 145
4.23 Dependency Ratio (DR) 150
4.24 The Sex Ratio (SR) 150
4.25 Population Pyramid, Texas 151
4.26 Crude, General, and Age-Specific Marriage
Rates 154
4.27 Measures of Educational Progression 155
4.28 Measures of Economic Activity 157
4.29 Direct and Indirect Age Standardization 160
4.30 Unique Components of Nuptiality Tables,
Tables of School Life, and Tables of
Working Life 170
4.31 Example of Using a Table of Working Life
to Determine Income Loss 172
5.1 Example of Controlling to a Total 180
5.2 Projections for a College-Dominated County
by Age for 1980-2020 NOT Adjusting for
Special Populations 180
5.3 Censal-Ratio Method with Symptomatic Data 185
5.4 Censal-Ratio Procedure with Housing Permit
Data: To Estimate the Austin, Texas,
Population for April 1, 1984 188
5.5 Censal-Ratio Method Using Electric Meter
Billing: To Estimate the Austin, Texas,
Population for April 1, 1988 190
5.6 Example of a Simple Ratio Technique 192
5.7 Vital Rates Method 193
5.8 Example of the Use of a Proration Technique 194
5.9 Composite Method 195
5.10 Steps for Completing an Estimate Using the
Ratio-Correlation Method 199

14. xiii
5.11 Ratio-Correlation Method: To Estimate
Population of Waco, Texas, 1982 200
5.12 Steps in and Example of the Use of a Cohort-
Survival Method of Population Estimation to
Estimate the Population of McLennan County,
Texas, April 1, 1988 206
5.13 Example of a Ratio-Based Technique 215
5.14 Example of a Land-Use Technique 216
5.15 Hypothetical Example of a Simple Economic-
Based Population Projection Method 221
5.16 Steps in and Example of the Use of the Cohort-
Component Method to Project the Population of
Harris County, Texas, by Five-Year Cohorts
from 1990 to 2000, Assuming 1980
Age-Sex Specific Fertility Rates and
Age-Sex Specific Survival Rates and
1970-1980 Age-Specific Net Migration Rates 235
5.17 Example of the Use of Three Commonly Used
Error Measures 246

16. Preface
For more than 15 years I have worked with local and state
planners and analysts and private-sector marketing and planning
specialists, attempting to share with them knowledge of demograph-
ic. concepts, data bases, and methods for addressing pragmatic
issues. At the same time, I have been involved with numerous
professional demographers in gaining recognition of the needs of
decisionmakers and the role of demographic data in the decision-
making process. I have also taught both social demography and
basic demographic methods courses to a diverse set of students from
such disciplines as sociology, psychology, political science, urban
and regional planning, history, anthropology, real estate develop-
ment, recreation and parks, and numerous other disciplines. All of
these activities have convinced me that demographic knowledge is
not only required in many different forms of analysis, but that much
of the existing demographic literature is too specialized for the
applied analyst who must examine a diverse range of phenomena,
only some of which are demographic.
The second author has likewise worked with private- and public-
sector decisionmakers for more than a decade. This experience,
coupled with his return to graduate school and his enrollment in
several classes in demography, convinced him that demography had
much to offer the policy analyst. At the same time, most works on
demography were either too specialized to meet the needs of ap-
plied analysts or attempted to provide broad overviews of interna-
tional population patterns that, although informative, were likely to
be of little direct utility to policy analysts.
This work reflects our belief that a single-source document is
necessary that can both introduce someone with only a basic social
science background to the concepts, data, and methods of applied
demography and can offer insight to professional demographers
regarding the specific methods and issues likely to be required of
them in pursuing applied demographic problems.
This work also represents our attempt to, at least partially, ad-
dress the need of the emerging area of applied demography for texts
that attempt to define its subject matter, its data, and its methods.
It represents an attempt to contribute to the development of what
we believe will be an increasingly important area of analysis in the
coming decades.

17. xvi
Finally, this work represents an effort aimed at drawing together
in a single source works that we have developed over 15 years in
the course of attempting to meet the needs of those who do demo-
graphic analyses. We have compiled numerous sets of workshop
materials and related workbooks and manuals on such topics as
small-area population estimates and projections, basic demographic
methods, and sources of information for business and government.
These materials, although clearly not sufficient to form the total
basis for this worlc, made it evident that a single, synthesized work
that was concisely focused on the concepts, methods, and materials
of greatest utility in completing applied analyses was needed and
likely to be of utility to applied analysts.
To address these concerns, we have developed a work that we
hope provides a basic introduction to the subject matter and meth-
ods of demography as applied to pragmatic issues and that is useful
to professional demographers who need more detailed information
on the areas of analyses likely to be of most importance in applied
uses of demography. Thus, the first two chapters introduce the
reader to demography and applied demography and provide a base
of knowledge about basic demographic concepts and current demo-
graphic trends. Chapter 3 introduces the data sources most often
used in demography. Although many of the data sources discussed
are widely known, we believe they are sufficiently detailed that
even professional demographers will benefit from it. Chapter 4
presents an introduction to the methods of applied demography that
provides essential background knowledge for those new to the
subject and examples of the applied uses of demographic data and
methods that introduce the professional demographer to substantive
issues addressed by applied analysts. Chapter 5 provides a detailed
discussion of methods of population estimation and projection and
of the evaluation of estimates and projections. These are among the
tasks most frequently required of applied demographers, and their
applications to small areas is seldom sufficiently covered in standard
demography curricula. Finally, Chapter 6 examines the problems
and opportunities likely to emerge from future changes in the
population and in applied demography in the United States in the
coming decades.
The work is intended to be useful to those with a basic educa-
tion in a social science or related discipline and requires no mathe-
matical skills beyond basic algebra. It will serve as a useful text for
multidisciplinary upper-level undergraduate and beginning-level
graduate courses in applied demography. It should also be a useful

18. xvii
reference source for the libraries of those who do applied demo-
graphic analysis in business, government, and academia.
Anyone attempting such a work is painfully aware that space
and other limitations prevent its being as comprehensive as one
would like. Likewise, it is not possible for this work to provide
sufficiently thorough discussions of several complex procedures to
allow its readers to employ such methods without the use of addi-
tional references. We have described such methods and demon-
strated them sufficiently to allow users to both know where to
obtain information necessary to apply these methods and the types
of uses to which these procedures may be appropriately applied.
Although the work has limitations, we hope that it proves bene-
ficial to its intended audiences in gaining basic knowledge of the
applied uses of demographic concepts, data, and methods. We trust
that it will soon be followed by other works providing additional,
and increasingly sophisticated, assistance to those who use demog-
raphy to address pragmatic issues. Even more important, we hope
that the work assists readers to more effectively use applied demo-
graphic concepts, data, and methods to arrive at solutions to real-
world problems.
Steve H. Murdock

20. Acknowledgments
In the completion of this work, the support, assistance, and
encouragement of numerous persons and agencies must be acknowl-
edged. The Department of Rural Sociology and the Texas Agricul-
tural Experiment Station in the Texas A:M University System
provided financial support for this effort and receive our sincere
appreciation. We wish also to thank the Real Estate Center at Texas
A:M University, especially its director, Dr. Richard Floyd. The
support of the center for the authors has been essential to the
completion of the work and to our gaining sensitivity to the needs
of a major segment of data users. We also extend our appreciation
to the Texas State Data Center and Texas Population Estimates and
Projections Programs and to the coordinating agency for these
programs, the Texas Department of Commerce, for allowing us to be
involved in these programs and to thus gain insight into the needs
of some of those persons most likely to use this work.
In the preparation of the book, numerous people have provided
assistance in preparing examples, in manuscript preparation, and in
providing critical reviews of the volume. Those who have assisted
in the development of initial examples for the works on which this
volume is partially based include Sean-Shong Hwang, Banoo Parpia,
John DeMontel, Pam Hopkins, Ken Backman, and Martha Nelson.
We thank them, even if belatedly. Recent students who have given
of their time and deserve our appreciation include Gavin Smith,
Rickie Fletcher, Jaime Vinas, Alvin Luedke, Marie Ballejos, Erik
Koehlert, and Paul Johnston. We also thank several staff members
including Beverly Pecotte, Darrell Fannin, Md. Nazrul Hoque,
George Galdiano, and Stephanie Rogers for their tireless efforts in
preparing data, proofreading, and copying the work for various
purposes. We owe special appreciation to Delma Jones and Teresa
Ray who tirelessly typed repeated drafts of the work and to Edwin
Gene and Elizabeth Porter whose expertise was essential to finishing
the work. We owe our most sincere thanks to Patricia Bramwell,
who was instrumental in the completion of every phase of the work
and who cheerfully tolerated the cranky authors during the final
, phases of the work. The work clearly would not have been com-
pleted without her extraordinary efforts in organizing and directly
participating in nearly all aspects of the work.
Special appreciation is also due to a former colleague who made
major contributions to all of the earlier works from which parts of
this work are drawn. This is Rita R. Leistritz. Her encouragement

21. xx
to undertake the works from which this is drawn and her tireless
efforts in developing countless examples cannot be adequately
acknowledged. Thank you, Rita, for your decade of effort.
We also wish to thank Donna Nunez who tirelessly edited the
work, repairing the authors' damaged grammar and punctuation
and providing consistency for two people who seem to thrive on
inconsistency. Thank you, Donna, for your efforts~
We owe particular appreciation to our reviewers who reviewed
the entire document and gave us useful and constructive criticisms.
These include Ken Backman, Stan Drezek, Tom Hirschi, Dan Lich-
ter, Rogelio Saenz, and Paul Voss. To each of them, we extend our
sincere appreciation for assisting us in making this a better work.
Finally, we extend our thanks to our colleagues, staff, friends,
and families who endured our impatience and our neglect of other
activities during the completion of the work.
S.H.M.

22. 1
Introduction
Rationale and Background
Demography has been popularized as it has become evident that
demographic characteristics and trends impact many aspects of our
society. Population change and the characteristics of the population
have effects on a wide range of factors, including markets for private
goods and services (Pol, 1987), forms of urban and regional growth
(Berry and Kasarda, 1977), the potential for economic development
(Backman, 1989), the likely incidence of disease and mortality
(Murdock et al., 1989a), and political redistricting and voting pat-
terns (Hill and Kent, 1988). Population patterns affect levels of
economic resources and poverty (Macunovich and Easterlin, 1990),
incidences of crime (Cohen and Felson, 1979; Stahura and Sloan,
1988), characteristics of the labor force (U.S. Bureau of Labor Statis-
tics, 1989), changes in enrollments in elementary and secondary
schools and in higher education (National Center for Educational
Statistics, 1989), changes in housing and real estate patterns (Stern-
lieb and Hughes, 1986; Murdock and Hamm, 1988a), and numerous
other factors (Russell, 1984; Merrick and Tordella, 1988). Demogra-
phy is important to those involved in product and service market-
ing, strategic and corporate planning, urban and regional analyses,
real estate development, economic development, medical and health
care, political analysis, financial analysis, crime prevention, person-
nel and human resource development, education, and many other
fields.
It is not the population patterns and trends themselves that are
the focus of attention for such persons, however, but the implica-
tions of these trends for nondemographic factors and events.
Applied demography thus focuses on pragmatic concerns of interest
to professionals whose training and experience lie largely outside
the small community of professional demographers.

23. 2
In fact, recognition of the importance of demographics is so
pervasive that nearly all professionals involved in private- or public-
sector marketing and planning use demographic data and perform
demographic analysis. Many have been forced to gain knowledge of
demographic processes and concepts, learn how to obtain and
manipulate demographic data, and master demographic analysis
techniques. These professionals often find themselves needing to
locate information to profile the current characteristics of the popula-
tion of alternative market or service areas; estimate the current and
project future populations likely to effect the demand for goods and
services; and to identify and quantify the effects of age, race/ethnici-
ty, household composition, and other factors on the use of goods
and services. Even when they are not directly responsible for the
development of demographic data and analyses (because the data
are purchased from private data provision firms), these analysts are
usually responsible for ensuring that the data and analyses are
appropriate. Such analysts must obtain knowledge of the demo-
graphic concepts, data sources, and the techniques underlying the
data and analyses that have been purchased.
Unfortunately, these professionals often find it difficult to obtain
the knowledge required to complete such tasks, because it is scat-
tered among a number of courses offered in formal demographic
training programs in academic settings or is available in a growing
but widely scattered set of materials in applied demography (Rives
and Serow, 1984; Pol, 1987; Saunders, 1988; Merrick and Tordella,
1988). Information on data sources are even more difficult to locate
because it is part of many different academic and applied fields of
study but unique to no single discipline (Murdock and Hamm,
1988b). In sum, practitioners have found that no single source exists
to address their needs.
Many professional demographers who were formally trained in
academic settings are becoming increasingly involved in the applied
uses of demography and are finding their formal training has not
properly prepared them to complete the tasks required of them in an
applied setting. For example, although they may have had several
courses that have provided them with indepth information on alter-
native techniques for completing regression analyses, they may have
had as little as a single class period in a demographic methods
course on techniques of population estimation. In this class period
they may have only examined such techniques as they are applied to
nations or states rather than small areas such as counties, places, or

24. 3
census tracts. They are likely to find, however, that the formulation
of population estimates for such small areas is among those tasks
most often required of them.
They may also find that they are required to extend their demo-
graphic knowledge far beyond the areas pursued in their graduate
training. This training may have required them to complete analy-
ses of the effects of demographic factors on social stratification and
inequality, segregation, suburbanization, and levels of socioeconom-
ic development. They are likely to have reviewed numerous studies
of the interrelationships between fertility control and economic
development, the determinants of mortality differentials, and the
factors affecting the adoption of contraception or abortion practices.
They are much less likely to have examined analyses of the effects of
migration on the market for multi-family housing, the effects of
changing racial/ethnic composition on retail markets, or the implica-
tions of differential rates of population growth on the need to relo-
cate a public health clinic. Professional demographers new to the
world of applied research may find themselves searching unsuccess-
fully for a source that brings together the information they are likely
to require on a frequent basis.
This book attempts to meet the needs of both those who are not
trained in demography, but who are increasingly required to either
do demographic analyses or evaluate the results of such analyses,
and of those who have been trained in demography but require
more information on its applied dimensions. It does this by provid-
ing an introduction to: (1) demographic concepts and processes as
used in demography and applied demography; (2) sources and
typical applied uses of the most widely used demographic data; and
(3) techniques for analyzing demographic patterns and the effects of
demographic factors on socioeconomic conditions and characteristics.
Its intent is to provide one of the first relatively comprehensive
single-source introductions to the concepts, methods, and data of
applied demography. We begin this task by defining and delineat-
ing the subject matter of applied demography.
Definition and the Dimensions
of Applied Demography
An important starting point for any work is the definition of its
subject matter, in this case, applied demography. Applied demog-
raphy must be seen as a part of the broader field of demography.

25. 4
However, within neither demography nor applied demography is
there universal agreement concerning the definition of what is, and
what is not, a proper area for demographic analysis. Therefore, the
reader should be aware that the definitions provided here do not
necessarily represent a consensus among demographers about the
definition of demography or applied demography.
The overall field of demography can be simply defined as the
study of human populations. Hauser and Duncan (1959), however,
note that demography has maintained two parallel traditions. One
is the domain of formal demography which has focused on the precise
mathematical measurement of the three demographic processes of fertility,
mortality, and migration. The sources of change in these processes,
the trends in these processes, the differentials in these processes,
and the interrelationships among these processes form the major
emphases in formal demography. The study of formal demographic
processes is often closely associated with mathematical demography.
Formal demography is an important but rather specialized subfield
within demography.
The second tradition in demography is broader and has a larger
number of adherents. It examines the determinants and conse-
quences of the demographic processes and of the size, distribution,
and composition of the populations that result from them. Thus
social demography can be defined as the study of the determinants and
consequences of population size, distribution, and composition and of the
demographic processes of fertility, mortality, and migration that determine
them. The emphases within this area of study has been on examin-
ing the interrelationships between demographic variables and other
social and economic variables. This concept of demography is
dominant in most academic departments teaching demography in
the United States. By comparison to formal demography, social
demography represents a substantial broadening of the subject
matter of demography.
In many regards, applied demography represents a further
extension of demography from the broader issues and dimensions
examined in social demography. As Rives and Serow note,
In our view, applied demography is that branch of the disci-
pline (of demography) that is directed toward the production,
dissemination, and analysis of demographic and closely relat-
ed socioeconomic information for quite specific purposes of
planning and reporting. To distinguish 11 applied11 pursuits
from other lines of demographic inquiry, we would further
suggest that applied demography is more concerned with the

26. measurement and interpretation of current and prospective
population change than with the behavioral determinants of
this change. . . .
Applied demography almost always deals with information
on population size, growth and composition for specific geo-
graphic areas. Thus there is an identifiable difference in the
unit of analysis: Applied demographers tend to focus on
geographic units and their population characteristics, while
others are more concerned with individuals and their demo-
graphic behavior (1984: 9-10).
5
Applied demography is thus different than the broader field of
demography in its relative emphases within the content areas of
demography. Rives and Serow (1984), suggest several emphases
that they believe separate the applied from the more basic aspects of
the discipline. We add to the areas delineated by Rives and Serow
(items 2, 3, and 5 below) and suggest that the differences between
basic and applied demography can be seen in terms of different
emphases within the following dimensions:
1. Scientific goal - Science can be seen as having three pri-
mary goals: description, explanation, and prediction.
Demography as a basic science tends to emphasize expla-
nation with secondary emphases on description and
prediction. Applied demography tends to emphasize
prediction, followed by description and explanation. In
addition, many applied uses of demography attempt to
establish concomitant demographic factors (e.g., for profil-
ing market segments). Such coincidental• occurrences
are seldom the focus of basic demographic analyses.
2. Time referent - Basic demography may examine demo-
graphic phenomena for historical, current, or future time
periods, but most frequently tends to involve attempts to
explain past events. Applied demography tends to place
emphasis on current and future patterns.
3. Geographic focus - Basic demography often attempts to
explain either international- or national-level patterns.
Applied demography tends to examine patterns for
subnational areas such as county and/or subcounty areas
(e.g., blocks, tracts). In addition, although general

27. 6
demographic analyses are nearly equally likely to employ
aggregate areal data and data on individuals, applied
demographic analyses place very heavy reliance on aggre-
gate areal data for small areas.
4. Purpose of the analyses - The science of demography in
its basic form tends to emphasize analyses intended to
generate basic knowledge about the causes of demograph-
ic change which can be generalized as widely as possible
across as many different types of areas as possible. In
applied demographic analyses, the emphasis is on the
application of knowledge to discern the consequences or
concomitants of demographic change rather than on basic
knowledge generation. Applied demographic analyses
often use data to discern the extent to which the findings
from general studies of other areas apply to a specific
study area.
5. Intended use of analytical results - Basic demography is
intended primarily to enhance the base of knowledge in
the discipline, knowledge which is shared among scholars
within the discipline. The results of applied demographic
analyses are intended to inform decisionmaking among
non-demographers relative to the planning, development,
and/or distribution of public- or private-sector goods or
services.
Taken together, these emphases suggest that applied demography
can be defined as
the study of population size, distribution, and composition
and of the processes of fertility, mortality, and migration
in a specified study area or areas with emphases on gaining
knowledge of the consequences and concomitants of demo-
graphic change to guide decisionmaking related to the
planning, development, and/or distribution of public- or
private-sector goods or services for current and future use in
the study area or areas.
As such a definition suggests, applied demography requires
knowledge of both the basic science of demography and the means
by which it can be applied to address pragmatic and policy-related
questions.

28. 7
The content of applied demography may also be examined by
describing the demographic variables on which its analyses tend to
concentrate. These variables include both demographic and those
found to have such dose relationships to demographic variables that
it is common practice to include them in almost any demographic
profiling of an area. These variables are
-population size
-population change
-mortality
-fertility
-migration (both national and international)
-population distribution (relative to metropolitan and
non-metropolitan areas, central cities and suburbs, rural
and urban areas, by the population size, density
of settlement, and among blocks, tracts, etc. of an area)
-compositional characteristics
·age
·sex/gender
·race
·ethnicity
·marital status (including never married, married,
separated, divorced, and widowed)
·household and family types
(including family and nonfamily households
and family and nonfamily households by sex
and marital status of householder [head] and
presence and/or number of children)
·educational status (both years and degrees
completed)
·employment by
-status (employed, unemployed or underemployed)
-occupation
-industry
·income, wealth, and poverty
·socioeconomic status (summative measures using
income, education, and occupational variables).
Of these variables, the education, employment, income, and soci-
oeconomic status variables might be considered as social and
economic rather than demographic variables. However, common
practice has so often included them in demographic analyses that it
is essential for those wishing to do applied demographic analyses to

29. 8
be familiar with the data sources and measures of these variables.
Oearly other analysts might include additional variables or delete
some of the variables noted here, but we believe that such variables
are sufficiently encompassing that, if one has gathered data and
completed analyses of these variables for an area, one can be said to
have completed a relatively complete demographic analysis of an
area. Consideration of these variables relative to the applied dimen-
sions noted above can thus be seen as delineating the content of
applied demography. The description of the content and trends in
these variables, the sources of data on them, and the measures and
techniques for analyzing them is the focus of this book.
Organization of the Text
In the remainder of Chapter 1, we describe the organization of
the text and delineate the limitations of the work. In so doing, we
attempt to introduce readers to key dimensions examined in the
work and alert them to topics for which additional references should
be consulted. At the end of the work, references to additional de-
tailed sources are provided.
Chapter 2 defines and delineates the major trends in each
demographic concept covered in the work. As noted above, these
include the basic demographic variables of population change, age,
sex, race/ethnicity, household, family, and marital status, population
size, geographic patterns of population distribution, and the three
demographic processes of fertility, mortality, and migration. Also
examined are variables closely related to the basic demographic
variables, including employment status, occupation, industry,
income, education, and socioeconomic status. These variables are
defined and the trends in such variables likely to impact factors of
interest to applied demographers are described. As a result of
examining this chapter, the reader should obtain a basic understand-
ing of demographic variables and of the role of such variables in
altering socioeconomic factors of relevance to applied private- and
public-sector interests.
Chapter 3 examines the sources of data on the variables de-
scribed in Chapter 2. National and international, state and local,
and private data sources are described. The discussion includes an
examination of the forms of data available and of the limitations in
obtaining and using such data. A detailed examination of the data
products from the 1990 Census is presented and an analysis of the
implications of these products for data use is provided.
The next section describes measures and techniques for analyz-

30. 9
ing the variables discussed in Chapters 2 and 3. Chapter 4 examines
basic measures of each of the variables and provides an introduction
to more comprehensive techniques utilizing multiple variables and
concepts such as life-table techniques (including a basic introduction
to multiple-decrement techniques), methods of standardization, and
rate decomposition. Because applied analyses tend to emphasize
current and future patterns, an entire chapter, Chapter 5, is devoted
to this topic. Thus, techniques to estimate and project population
and to evaluate population estimates and projections are examined
in Chapter 5. For each of these topics, examples of the use of the
techniques to address applied questions are presented.
The concluding chapter, Chapter 6, examines future trends that
are likely to become the focus of applied demographic analyses in
the future. Topical and substantive areas expected to provide the
basis for the expansion of applied demographic analyses in the
coming decades are then discussed. Finally, we examine the current
status of applied demography and suggest opportunities and poten-
tial problems affecting its future development.
Limitations of the Book
As with any such effort, space considerations, as well as the
experience and knowledge base of the authors, have limited this
book. The variables and techniques described and demonstrated are
limited to those we believe are most likely to be of use in applied
demography and are clearly only some of those which might be
examined.
In addition, the use of these factors are demonstrated for areas
in the United States so that the increasingly important international
uses of demography are not directly addressed. Similarly, emphasis
is placed on data sources used for applications in the United States.
It is also important to note that since this book was written as 1990
Census materials were just beginning to be released, much of the
discussion of 1990 Census products is based on the publication plans
of the U.S. Bureau of the Census. If the 1990 Census is similar to
past censuses, the final products are likely to be somewhat different
in form and more limited than those initially planned.
Greater emphasis is also placed on somewhat simpler techniques
rather than more sophisticated methods. For example, sophisticated
multiple-decrement life table techniques and multi-state regional
projection models are examined in only a very general manner.
This reflects our attempt to cover those topics we believe are likely
to be most frequently used by those who are entering the field of

31. 10
applied demography and which are used in applied demography as
presently practiced. As the field of applied demography develops,
increasingly sophisticated techniques should come into more
common usage, and efforts such as this will require updating and
expansion.
Finally, it is likely that this effort is limited somewhat by the au-
thors' bases of experience which have largely been in the public
sector. Although a concerted effort was made to overcome this
limitation, it is likely that the authors' backgrounds and experiences
affected and perhaps limited the work in regard to some private-
sector uses of demographic techniques.
Despite. these limitations, we hope the work will be a useful
addition to the applied demographic literature. We also hope that
this attempt to introduce the concepts, methods, and data of applied
demography will encourage other scholars and practitioners to
develop additional works of utility for those who, not only study,
but also apply the body of knowledge in demography to address
pragmatic issues. It is to further explicate such issues and concepts,
as well as the data and techniques used to address them, that we
now tum our attention.

32. 2
Demographic Concepts and Trends:
The Conceptual Base and Recent Patterns
of Demographic Change
The discussion in this chapter is intended to define the major
concepts and variables used in applied demography and to provide
information that will allow the reader to obtain an initial base of
demographic knowledge regarding current patterns for the measures
of these concepts and variables. It must be recognized, however,
that no single chapter, or any single work, can replace the need for
continuous study to obtain and maintain knowledge of demographic
change.
Defining Key Concepts and Terms
In this section, we examine some of the key concepts and terms
used in demography and demographic analyses. It is essential for
those using demographic data to be aware of the underlying defini-
tions and dimensions of demography's key concepts. We delineate
these concepts briefly below indicating both how they are defined
and the major differentials or variations in them among different
demographic groups and relative to other demographic, social, and
economic factors.
Population
Perhaps the most basic of all terms in demography is that of
population. A population consists of the persons living in a specific geo-
graphical area at a specific point in time (see Ryder, 1964 for a useful
description of the concept of population). Two aspects of the con-
cept of population as used in demography are important to empha-
size.

33. 12
First, the term population tends to be used to refer to aggregate
characteristics of a population living in an area; that is, to character-
istics that are descriptive of the population but not necessarily of any
given individual within the population. For example, a population's
death rate is not reducible to the individuals within the population.
That is, any given person in an area is either alive or dead at a
given point in time; he or she has no death rate. On the other
hand, a population's death rate is the aggregate effect of all deaths
in the population. A death rate is thus uniquely an aggregate rather
than an individualistic measure.
A second aspect of the concept of population as used in demog-
raphy (and in statistics) is that it is used to refer to all of the persons
rather than to simply some (a sample) of the persons in an area.
Demographers often refer to a subgroup of a total population as the
population of persons with certain characteristics (e.g., the popula-
tion of females, the population of black residents), but when the
term population is used, the emphasis is generally on the total, the
sum total of, persons within an area.
Subpopulations and Cohorts
Persons using demographic data often also refer to subpopula-
tions such as the old, the young, blacks, whites, Hispanics, the baby
boomers, and similar groups. Any population group in a specified
area composed of persons with one or more common characteristics
can be referred to as a subpopulation. The concept of a cohort is
more specific and refers to agroup of persons with the common character-
istic of being born during the same period of time. Members of a cohort
may have other common characteristics (e.g., they may be males or
females, black, Hispanic, white), but they will always be persons of
similar ages. In addition, it should be recognized that the cohort is
a concept used in a very unique way in the social sciences (Glenn,
1977). It tends to refer not only to the possession of a common
biological age, but also to the fact that persons in any given cohort
are passing through the life cycle exposed to certain similar effects.
Cohort connotes not only birth during aspecified period, but commonality
resulting from the fact that its members have been socializ.ed during a period
of time with specific socioeconomic and historical events that are likely to
cause them to exhibit similar behaviors and have similar perspectives. For
example, those who reached adulthood during the Great Depression
of the 1930s are commonly referred to as the depression cohort,
those socialized during the 1960s as the sixties generation, those

34. 13
born from 1946 to 1964 as the baby-boom generation, and those born
after 1964 as the baby-bust generation. Such groups are seen as
having unique characteristics that are a function not only of age, but
also of sharing a commonality of experiences during their childhood
and young-adult formation years (Ryder, 1965).
In demography and the social sciences generally, the concept of
cohort is also used to connote a specific form of analysis in which
groups of persons (i.e., given cohorts) are followed through time in
an attempt to discern whether certain characteristics displayed by
them, such as changes in rates of births, income levels, etc., are a
function of cohort effects or of other factors. Often, cohort effects
are differentiated relative to the effects of a specific period of time
(referred to as period effects) and effects that are a function of age
(that is, age effects). By comparing the patterns for a cohort across
time relative to the patterns for persons at the cohort's age at several
different points in time (relative to period effects) and relative to
patterns for different age groups at different points in time (age
effects), the unique effects of being a member of a given cohort can
be, at least partially, identified (Mason et al., 1973; Glenn, 1977;
Palmore, 1978; Rodgers, 1982).
Population Change
Population change is a function of three processes referred to as
the demographic processes or components. These are births, deaths
and migration. The relationship between these variables is perhaps
best seen in the simple population equation (sometimes also called the
lJookkeeping equation of population). This equation is as follows:
P P B D M
t2 = tl + tl - t2 - tl - t2 + tl - t2
Where: Pt2 = population for a second date (t2)
Pt1 = population at the base date (t1)
Bt1 - t2 = number of births that occur during the time
interval from the base date (t1) to the second
date (t2)
0 t1 - t2 = number of deaths that occur during the time
interval from the base date (t1) to the
second date (t2)

35. 14
Mt1 - 12 = amount of net migration that occurs during
the time interval from the base date (t1) to
the second date (12)
Therefore, to understand population change, it is necessary to
understand patterns of births, deaths, and migration.
Understanding the sources of population change, whether it is a
result of patterns of births and deaths (processes whose combined
effects are referred to as natural increase or natural change) or of migra-
tion, is of vital importance because the determinants and conse-
quences of the processes of natural increase and migration are quite
different.
Death is a result of physiological processes and the attempt to
lengthen life is a major goal of nearly every society. Fertility in-
volves a biological process which results from sexual behavior that
may or may not hav~ been intended to produce a conception and
birth. Migration is a behavior involving moving from one area to
another. Although migration often involves reactions to physical
factors (e.g., shortages of food and other basic necessities for surviv-
al), migration is clearly the demographic process that is most often a
result of non-physiological processes, such as employment, income,
and other socioeconomic changes (Long, 1988).
As a result, although deaths and births impact a population by
decreasing or increasing its size, their effects on other nondemo-
graphic and socioeconomic factors are usually long-term. Migration
by contrast has a more immediate impact on an area because it is
more likely to involve young adults in their family-formation ages.
In terms of commercial activities, births and deaths are likely to
have immediate impacts on only a few markets (such as markets for
baby goods) and may lead to long-term growth or decline in markets
for housing and other goods and services. However, migration
tends to have immediate impacts, reducing markets for products and
services in areas with net outmigration and creating immediate
demands for all those goods and services necessary to establish a
residence in areas with patterns of net inrnigration.
The Demographic Processes
(Components of Population Change)
As noted above, the three processes that change populations are fertil-
ity, mortality, and migration. These involve births into a population,
deaths from a population, and migration either into or out of a

36. 15
population. Although these processes are sufficiently well known as
to not require the presentation of extensive definitions, selected
aspects of each, and related terms often associated with each, re-
quire some description.
Fertility. Fertility refers to reproductive behavior in populations.
Fertility rates indicate the relative incidence of births in a popula-
tion. Fertility is commonly distinguished from fecundity which refers
to the biological capacity to conceive and bear children. Fertility tends to
be highest among women in their twenties and lower among
women of younger or older ages with the child-bearing ages being
variously defined as starting at age 10 or 15 years of age and extend-
ing to ages 44 or 49. Recently, women in their thirties have shown
increases in fertility. Although the rates for women in their thirties
remain lower than those for women in their twenties, the pattern of
high fertility for women in their late thirties is largely unprecedent-
ed. At present, it is unclear whether this new pattern is a tempo-
rary result of delayed child-bearing among baby-boom-era women or
a new longer term pattern of increased fertility (however, see Ryder,
1990). Fertility has also tended to be higher among populations
with fewer socioeconomic resources. This applies both to societies
taken as a whole (e.g., fertility is generally higher in developing
than in developed nations} and also to specific groups within any
given society (i.e., persons with fewer socioeconomic resources tend
to have more children than those with more socio-economic re-
sources}.
Mortality. Mortality refers to the incidence of deaths in a popula-
tion. It is commonly distinguished from morbidity which refers to the
incidence of disease in a population. It is often discussed in terms of the
contravailing process of survival-that is, the probability of surviving
over a given period of time. Mortality in the United States and
other developed nations has tended to demonstrate the presence of
what some refer to as an epidemiological transition (Preston, 1976).
This is a shift in an area from conditions in which a majority of
deaths occur from infectious diseases (pneumonia, diarrhea, dysen-
tery, etc.} to ones in which chronic diseases (coronary disease,
cancer, etc.) are the major causes of death. Mortality tends to also
be differentiated by socioeconomic factors such that mortality is
substantially higher among those with more limited socioeconomic
resources. As discussed in detail below, the analysis of mortality is
often completed using a set of procedures referred to as life-table

37. 16
techniques, techniques in which the distribution and impacts of
deaths over time are simulated in a hypothetical population. Be-
cause it is one indicator of an area's likely level of economic devel-
opment, infant mortality (deaths to persons during their first year of
life) is often used as a measure of socioeconomic development in
analyses of socioeconomic conditions.
Migration. Migration refers to the movement of persons in a popula-
tion from one area to another. Unlike the demographic processes of
fertility and mortality, migration is not discretely fixed in time and
space, that is, to define migration requires that one define when and
how far someone has moved. Migration is usually distinguished
from both daily patterns of movement and short-distance permanent
moves. That is, commuting and similar, frequent patterns of re-
peated travel that do not involve a change in residence and move-
ments within the same general residence area (e.g., a move from
one housing unit to another in the same neighborhood) are not
commonly referred to as migration. The U.S. Bureau of the Census
defines migration in terms of a change in residence in which the origin
residence and the destination residence are in different counties.
Migration researchers have variously defined migration (Ritchey,
1976) but Mangalam and Schwarzweller (1968) have usefully defined
migration as involving movement of a person from one social system
to another in which the migrant is required to change friendship and
social and economic interrelationships. Whatever the definition,
migration tends to result from a complex set of economic, demo-
graphic, and social factors (Long, 1988) and has, as a result, received
extensive attention from other social scientists as well as demogra-
phers (Ritchey, 1976; Greenwood, 1985; Lichter and DeJong, 1990).
Migration is distinguished also by its direction and by whether
or not it involves crossing a national boundary. Migration involving
two nations is referred to by the terms immigration and emigration.
When referenced in regard to the receiving nation, persons moving
into that nation have immigrated to it while persons leaving it are
emigrating from it. Migration within a nation is referred to using
the terms inmigration and outmigration for movement (in the
United States defined as movement involving a change in residence
from one county to another) from the perspective of the receiving
and sending areas respectively. All areas tend to have both in- and
outmigration (and/or if it also involves international movement, im-
and emigration). As a result, two terms are frequently used to

38. 17
identify the joint effects of in and out migration (or im- and emigra-
tion). These terms are gross migration, to refer to the sum of in and out
movements, and net migration, to refer to the difference between in and out
movement. Net migration is perhaps the most widely used term with
a plus sign being used before a net migration value to indicate net
inmigration and a negative sign used to indicate net outmigration
relative to a reference area.
As a process, migration tends to occur most frequently among
young adults and to decrease in frequency with age, to be more
prevalent among members of populations with higher levels of
education, higher incomes, and higher status occupations (that is,
among persons with greater socioeconomic resources) and among
those in developed nations. The level of migration also tends to
increase during periods of economic expansion and to be reduced by
periods of recession and depression (Greenwood, 1985).
Population Distribution
Population distribution refers to how the population of an area is dis-
tributed relative to its physical land area and according to key sites or types
of sites (e.g., rural and urban areas, small and large cities) in the area..
Populations are distributed within an area as a result of a variety of
physical and socioeconomic factors such as environmental features
or employment patterns. Populations redistribute themselves by the
three demographic processes of fertility, mortality, and migration,
with migration providing the most common form of rapid redistribu-
tion. An area's population distribution is commonly described
according to such categories as rural and urban, metropolitan and
nonmetropolitan, and by the size of the population of settlement
sites, by the density of settlement, etc.
In general, developed nations such as the United States have
shown patterns of increasing concentration of their populations in
large urban centers. As a result of such patterns, by 1990, 77.5
percent of the population of the United States lived in metropolitan
centers compared to 22.S percent who lived in nonmetropolitan
areas. Also prevalent in the United States in recent decades has
been an increasing concentration of residents in suburban areas
within larger metropolitan areas (Frey and Speare, 1988) and the
more extensive growth of the southern and western regions of the
United States relative to the northeastern and midwestem regions of
the United States (Long, 1988).

39. 18
Population Composition
Population composition refers to the characteristics of a population.
Such characteristics include whether the population is young,
middle aged, or elderly; predominantly male or female; composed
primarily of single or married adults; and of persons living primarily
in single-person or multi-person households or in families. It in-
volves knowing how many occupied housing units are rented and
how many are owned; how many persons are white or black;
Hispanic or non-Hispanic; wealthy or poor; well-educated or poorly
educated; employed in professional and white-collar occupations or
blue-collar and laborer occupations; and employed primarily in ex-
tractive industries (such as agriculture or mining), or in manufactur-
ing or service industries. Knowledge of such characteristics is
among the most important factors in understanding how to use
demographic information to address such pragmatic issues as how a
population will react to a given set of events or a new product or
service. We briefly examine key compositional characteristics of
populations by describing several of the major demographic charac-
teristics and the major differentials associated with them within the
U.S. population.
Age. Age is commonly measured as the age of a person as of
their last birthday. Age is a biological and chronological factor with
demographic, social, and economic importance. Certain rights, (e.g., the
right to vote and to marry) and obligations (for military duty or legal
culpability) are related to age. As noted above, the concept of
cohort, referring to a group of persons born during a specific period
of time, is a commonly used age-related concept in demography.
Similarly, certain age-determined groups related to specific stages in
the life cycle and/or specific dates are also commonly referred to in
applied demographic analyses. School-age persons are commonly
those 3-to-17 or 18 years of age, college-aged are generally those 18-
to-24 years of age, women of child-bearing age are those who are 10
or 15-to-44 or 49 years of age, middle-aged those 40 or 45-to-60 or 64
years of age, and the elderly those 65 years of age or older. The
baby-boom generation refers to those born in the years inclusive of
1946 through 1964 and the baby-bust generation to those born after
1964. Age is generally reported in either single years or five-year
age groups starting with the five-year age group of 0 through 4
years of age and ending with an age group that includes persons in
a specific age and all older ages (e.g., 65 or 75 and older). Median

40. 19
age is perhaps the most commonly used measure of age. The most
often noted trend is that the age of the population (at least in de-
veloped nations such as the United States), has increased substan-
tially such that the median age of residents of the United States was
roughly 23 in 1900, 33 in 1990, and is expected to be about 36 in the
year 2000 (Spencer, 1989).
Sex or Gender. Sex is a variable with biological, demographic, social.,
and economic significance. Gender is now the commonly used term to
connote the nonbiological differences associated with differences in sex. In
this text, we use the term sex because emphasis is placed on biologi-
cal differences. This is not intended, however, to diminish the
importance of the critical socioeconomic dimensions entailed in
gender differences.
Although approximately 105 males are born per 100 females,
due to the greater life-expectancy of females, the number of females
becomes roughly equal to the number of males between the ages of
20 and 30, and females outnumber males by nearly 2-to-1 at ages
over 80. Females have historically been the focus of discrimination
and received substantially lower returns to their labors, earning 60
to 65 percent of that earned by males in the same jobs. In addition,
females are heavily concentrated in clerical and other occupations
with low returns to labor. The distribution between the sexes is
generally described simply in terms of the percent of the population
0£ each sex or by the sex ratio which indicates the number of males per
100 females.
Race/Ethnicity. Race and ethnicity are commonly used to refer
to differences among population groups related to differences in
cultural, historical, or national-origin characteristics. Although the
concept of race was once assumed by some segments 0£ some socie-
ties to describe a base of biological differences, race has come to indi-
.cate differences that are largely socioeconomic and cultural. Ethnicity
generally refers to the national, cultural, or ancestral. origins of a people.
In the two most recent censuses, both concepts were measured by
respondents self-identifying themselves using two separate ques-
tions. For example, one question on the 1990 Census form asked re-
spondents to identify themselves using the racial categories of
white; black; American Indian, Eskimo or Aleut; or Asian and Pacif-
ic Islander with the last category having nine alternative Asian and
Pacific Islander categories (Chinese, Filipino, Hawaiian, Korean,
Vietnamese, Japanese, Asian Indian, Samoan, Guamanian) plus an
other (Asian and Pacific Islander) category with space provided to

41. 20
write in a response. Finally, this question provided an other
category with a space for the respondent to write in a response.
A second question asked census respondents to indicate whether
they were of Spanish/Hispanic Origin, for which they were given
the response categories of no and yes with the yes response having
the alternative categories of response of Mexican or Mexican Ameri-
can or Chicano; Puerto Rican; Cuban; and other Hispanic with a
blank being provided to write in a specific response to the other
Hispanic category.
These two questions are intended to determine both the race
and Spanish/Hispanic Origin for each respondent but many
respondents are apparently confused by these questions. For
example, nearly 90 percent of Hispanics have historically reported
themselves to be white but in the 1980 and 1990 Censuses many
reported themselves as being in the other race category. Thus, of
the 9.8 million persons who indicated that their race was other in
1990, more than 97 percent were Hispanics. Many Hispanics appar-
ently used the Other category as a residual category because they
were uncertain how to respond to the race question. Terms such as
Anglo, which is commonly used to refer to white non-Hispanics,
cannot be determined directly from the census items but must be
derived by cross-classifying the results from the race and ethnicity
questions. It is obvious that race and ethnicity are complex concepts
both for those who would measure them and for persons who
respond to questions about them.
In addition to questions on race and ethnicity, other data on
heritage are also available from the census and elsewhere. These
indicators of heritage include country of birth and ancestry (such as
whether a respondent is English, German, etc.). These latter data
are important for identifying such factors as preferences in food and
other products that have distinct cultural origins.
In analyses for the United States, the minority groups most
often examined are blacks, Hispanics, and Asians. The most impor-
tant demographic differentials among such groups in the United
States are the substantially faster rates of growth among minority
populations relative to majority groups and the increasing share of
the population that is minority. In 1980, for example, blacks were
11.7 percent of the population, persons of Asian extraction made up
1.5 percent of the population and persons of Hispanic origin ac-
counted for 6.4 percent of the U.S. resident population of
226,545,805. From 1980 to 1990, the total population increased by
9.8 percent, but the black population increased by 13.2 percent, the
Asian population by 107.8 percent and the Hispanic population by

42. 21
53.1 percent. By 1990, blacks made up 12.1 percent, Asians 2.9
percent and Hispanics 9.0 percent of the 248,709,873 persons in the
United States, together accounting for nearly 60 million persons. In
addition, by 2025, U.S. Bureau of the Census projections (Spencer
1986; 1989) suggest that blacks could account for 14.6 percent of the
population, persons in other races (including Asians) for 6.5 percent
and Hispanics for 13.1 percent. Clearly, patterns associated with
these groups will increasingly shape public- and private-sector
events in U. S. Society.
For purposes of applied product- and service-related analyses,
the importance of race and ethnicity lies primarily in the fact that
racial and ethnic minorities, such as blacks and Hispanic Americans,
tend to have more limited socioeconomic resources. Poverty rates
are two to three times those for whites, incomes approximately 60 to
70 percent of those for whites, and levels of education are substan-
tially less than those for whites (for example, in 1980, 40% of
Hispanics in the United States and 27% of blacks had 8 or fewer
years of education compared to just 17% of whites, while roughly
8% of Hispanics and blacks had a college education compared to
17% of whites). This affects the purchasing powers of such minori-
ties and increases their levels of need for many types of public serv-
ices. This unfortunate relationship between minority status and
reduced socioeconomic resources is pervasive across nearly all re-
gions of the United States and is evident among certain minority
groups in other nations as well. By contrast, Asians tend to have
lower levels of poverty, to be more highly educated, and to have
higher incomes than whites. Because of such differences, race and
ethnic differences are a major topic of demographic analyses.
Marital Status. Marital status is closely related to the likely
economic circumstances of the household members within married-
couple versus unmarried-person households, the probability that a
woman will bear off-spring, and numerous other factors. Distinc-
tions are usually made between those persons who have never been
in an officially recognized union, referred to as the never married;
those in such a union, the married; and those who have previously
been in such a union but are either separated, divorced, or wid-
owed. Increasingly, however, it is evident that a substantial number
of persons are in unions that lead them to make joint decisions, but
whose unions lack the formal status of marriage, such as persons
who are cohabitating (Bumpass and Sweet, 1989). The trends in
marital status over time show that an increasing proportion of

43. 22
persons will either not ever be married or will find themselves in a
broken union of some form.
Marital status and its trends are important for those who do
applied analyses because those in marital unions tend to have more
resources than those in other forms of unions or those who are not
in unions. Analyses show that persons in households that have
been disrupted by marital dissolution are likely to experience
substantial disadvantages compared to those in intact households
relative to income and socioeconomic opportunities (Bianchi and
McArthur, 1991). They are likely to have lower purchasing power
and more imminent needs for public services than those in married
unions. The delineation of the variable of marital status thus
continues to be of importance.
Household and Family Characteristics. Household and family
characteristics are important because they indicate ways that group-
ings of intimate persons are united in response to demographic,
social, and economic conditions. They are purchasing and consum-
ing units, and their numbers and characteristics have significant
implications for the demand for goods and services. As generally
defined, a household refers to the persons living in a single housing unit.
A housing unit is any type of residence (house, apartment, mobile
home, townhouse, condominium, etc.) that is occupied as a separate
living quarters (quarters in which occupants live and eat separately
from persons in other households and which have access to their
living area from the outside of a building). Households are of one of
two types, family or nonfamily. Family households c.onsist of two or more
persons who are related by marriage, birth, or adoption, while nonfamily
households c.onsist of one person or two or more unrelated persons living in
a single housing unit. Within family households, distinctions are
commonly made between families with married couples (both with
and without children) and those involving a male or female house-
holder with one or more children or other relative. The term
householder was established in the late 1970s to avoid the use of the
term of head of household which persons tended to assume referred
to a male. A householder is the person in whose name a unit is owned or
rented or anyone so designated as the major supporter of the household by
other household mem11ers. As with the term head, it is largely used as
a term indicative of the person who provides a majority of the
support for a household.
Trends in households and families have been among the most
important demographic changes affecting the public and private

44. 23
sectors. In general, these trends show that the size of households
has decreased (from an average of 3.67 persons in 1940 to 2.63 per-
sons per household in 1990), the number of households involving
married-couple families has declined (from 70.6% in 1970 to 55.1%
in 1990), and nonfamily households are growing more rapidly than
family households (e.g., family households increased by 11% from
1980 to 1990, while nonfamily households increased by 29.0%).
These changes are important because they have affected both the
number of households and the socioeconomic resources of house-
holds. For example, the number of households in the United. States
increased from 63.4 million in 1970 to 91.9 million in 1990, an in-
crease of 28.5 million. However, if the average size of households
in 1970 of 3.17 persons had prevailed in 1990 (instead of the average
household size of 2.63 persons), there would have been only 76.3
million households in 1990 rather than 91.9 million. Thus, it can be
argued that 15.6 million of the 28.5 million increase in households
from 1970 to 1990 was a result of changes in household size, rather
than population change and other factors. The wealth of house-
holds is also markedly affected by their composition. For example,
although median household income in all households in the United
States was $28,906 in 1989, it was $38,664 for married-couple fami-
lies but only $17,383 for families with a female householder and no
spouse present. Household and family characteristics clearly require
careful analysis because they have quantitative and qualitative
impacts on a population's standard of living.
The only persons who do not live in households are those who
live in various types of institutions, such as those in college dormito-
ries, long-term care facilities, ·military bases, prisons, and other insti-
tutional settings. These persons are referred to as the group-quarters
population. Although they are a small proportion of the total U.S.
population (about 6.7 million of 248.7 million in 1990), they must be
removed from the total population in examining and computing
household size and are a significant part of the populations of some
areas. Their significance for applied public- and private-sector
analyses lies in the fact that they tend to have distinctly different
patterns of expenditures and service usage. Failure to recognize that
an area has a large group-quarters' population is likely to lead to a
faulty analysis of the socioeconomic limitations and opportunities of
the population in a .market or service-delivery area. In addition, as
noted below, failure to adjust for group quarters populations in
making population estimates and projections can lead to inaccuracies
in estimates and projections.

45. 24
Educational Status. The level of education and training in a
population is an increasingly important indication of that
population's ability to compete in the global market place. Education
is commonly measured in either years of school completed or in terms of the
attainment of certain levels of education such as grade school, high
school, technical school, college, graduate school, or professional
school. Although educational involvement can occur at any age, it
is most commonly examined relative to such involvement in the
ages from about 3 or 5 years of age to 35 years of age. Trends in
education have generally been ones of increased general levels of
education in the United States since 1940 with the proportion of
persons completing high school nearly tripling since 1940 but with
marked differentials in education remaining between those with
larger socioeconomic resource bases and those with smaller resource
bases.
Employment Status, Occupation, and Industry of Employment.
Employment refers to the characteristic of being involved in an activi.ty that
results in the attainment of resources for the person or per$ons involved.
In the United States, the characteristic of employment in a popula-
tion is most often assessed relative to a population's involvement in
gainful activity as measured by the proportion of eligible persons
(usually defined as persons 14 or 16 through 64 years of age) who
are either employed or unemployed. It is also measured in terms of
the type of job held by those employed, referred to as the occupa-
tion of employment (e.g., employment in professional or technical
occupations, crafts or service occupations), or the type of business,
referred to as the industry of employment (e.g., agriculture, mining,
manufacturing, services). Those in the labor force but not employed at a
given point in time are the unemployed. Attempts are also sometimes
made to assess the extent to which a population is underemployed as
indicated by fewer hours of work than is considered normal for a
person employed full-time (full-time employment is variously de-
fined as involving employment of 30, 35, or 40 or more hours per
week) and/or employment of persons in jobs with skill and educa-
tional requirements that are less than the levels of education and
skill they possess (Lichter and Constanzo, 1987).
The major trends in patterns of employment are those toward
increased proportions of persons being employed in service occupa-
tions and industries and a decreasing proportion employed in labor
and other low-skill occupations and in extractive (such as agriculture

46. 25
and mining) or manufacturing industries. Of significance as well is
the increase in the proportion of women in the labor force, even
among those with young children. Finally, there remains a substan-
tial difference in levels of unemployment and underemployment
among those with larger and fewer socioeconomic resources, those
with fewer resources having substantially higher rates of unem-
ployment and underemployment, lower economic returns to their
labor, and longer periods of unemployment between jobs.
Income, Wealth, and Poverty. These characteristics indicate the
relative resources of a population for obtaining goods and services.
Income generally refers to money income received. on a recurrent basis as a
return for labor. It may include wages, pension funds, various forms of
public assistance, interest income, and even in-kind resources (e.g., the
value of a rent-free residence). The three measures most commonly
used to measure it are per capita income, mean income, and median
income. Per capita income is the arithmetic mean income per person
in an area. Mean income is often computed per household or family.
Median income is the income level that equally divides a ranked
income distribution of persons, households or families. Wealth refers
to the possession of goods, property, and other items that have a
market value; that is, that could be sold for a given amount.
Poverty is the absence of wealth and is an officially designated
amount of money which varies over time (depending on assess-
ments of the cost of living, household type and size, and the
number of children in a household). Income is commonly discussed
either in terms of current (nominal) dollar values or in terms of
constant dollars; that is, expressed in terms of the dollars for a
specific year for which adjustments have been made for rates of
inflation.
Data on income have shown relatively little change in incomes
for households since the late 1970s, when constant dollar income
values are examined. The elderly have shown the largest increases
in income of any age group, while relative incomes of racial and
ethnic minorities and of women and children have shown few
gains in the last decade relative to those for majority populations
and males. Wealth tends to be concentrated in majority populations
and among those in middle and elderly ages and much of the asset
wealth of Americans has been found to lie in the value of homes
(U.S. Bureau of the Census, 1990c). Poverty has remained relatively
stable in the total population but has increased among children and
decreased among the elderly.

47. 26
Socioeconomic Status. Sodoeconomic status is a variable which
attempts to measure the combined effects of income, occupation, and educa-
tion. As commonly defined, the socioeconomic status of persons in
a population is a function of employment in certain occupations and
the possession of higher income and educational levels. In the
United States, employment in professional fields (such as medicine
and law), high incomes, and advanced levels of education common-
ly connote higher socioeconomic status. This status involves both
the possession of monetary resources and of prestige that allows one
to have a greater influence on decisions. Although socioeconomic
status is largely a social variable, the influence of socioeconomic
characteristics on such demographic factors as infant mortality, fertil-
ity rates, rates of migration, the density of settlement, household
size, as well as numerous other factors, suggest its relevance in
demographic analyses.
Socioeconomic status can be formally measured through the
use of several widely used indices which combine income, educa-
tion, and occupational factors into a single score. Among the most
widely used of such scales are those by Duncan et al. (1972) and
Nam and Powers (1983). However measured, socioeconomic status
is an important variable in the determination of purchasing patterns
and preferences for private-sector goods and services and the need
for many types of public services.
An Overview of ¥ajor Demographic Trends in the United States
The above concepts are ones that are central to demographic
analyses. Having provided a basic overview of their content, it is
important to briefly describe changes in the patterns related to these
factors. Such basic knowledge is essential because it allows the
applied analyst to anticipate the demographic conditions and trends
likely to be evident in an analysis for any given area and to evaluate
the likely accuracy of an analysis by comparing patterns identified in
it to general patterns and trends. Below, a basic overview is provid-
ed of recent and projected future trends in the demographic factors
described above for the United States.
Population Change
Table 2.1 provides data showing the historical growth of the
population of the United States from the first census in 1790 to the
most recent 1990 Census. The data in this table show that the
United States has had a history of rapid growth, exceeding 30

48. Year
1790
1800
1810
1820
1830
1840
1850
1860
1870
1880
1890
1900
1910
1920
1930
1940
1950
1960
1970
1980
1990
Table 2.1: Total Resident Population and Percent
Population Change In the United States,
1790-1990
Tota I Percent
Population Change
3,929,214
5,308,483 35.1
7,239,881 36.4
9,638,453 33.1
12,866,020 33.5
17,069,453 32.7
23,191,876 35.9
31,443,321 35.6
39,818,449 26.6
50,155,783 26.0
62,947,714 25.5
75,994,575 20.7
91,972,266 21.0
105,710,620 14.9
122,775,046 16.1
131,669,275 7.2
151,325,790 14.9
179,323,175 18.5
203,302,031 13.4
226,545,805 11.4
248,709,873 9.8
Source: Values for 1790-1970 from United States Department
of Commerce, Bureau of the Census. Historlcal Statistics of
the United States: Colonial Times to 1970, Part 1 and Part 2,
Washington DC: U.S. Government Printing Office, 1975.
Values for 1980 and 1990 from the PL94-171 Census Tapes
for the appropriate censuses.
27

49. 28
percent per decade for all decades from 1790 through
1860 and 20 percent for those from 1860 through 1910. Most of the
decades of the twentieth century have produced patterns of reduced
growth relative to those of the eighteenth and nineteenth century.
Rates of growth after 1910 have been at levels of less than two
percent per year, and the most recent census shows the 1980 to 1990
period to have produced the slowest growth of any decade in the
twentieth century, except for the decade of the Great Depression.
Slow growth is the prevailing pattern and one that is likely to con-
tinue.
Components of Population Change
U.S. population growth has been largely dependent on
natural increase, despite extensive immigration. In fact, analyses of
data since the early 1800s suggests that even during the period of
most extensive immigration to the United States, 1880 to 1920,
migration never accounted for more than 40 percent of population
growth in any decade (Nam and Philliber, 1984). Table 2.2 shows
the components of growth for the period from 1940 to 1990. An
analysis of this table shows that migration has become a renewed
source of growth in recent decades. Migration, which was 3.3 to 3.5
million in the 1950s and 1960s, exceeded 14 million between 1970
and 1990, while natural increase peaked during the height of the
baby boom in the 1950s and then declined. Thus, the estimates of
intercensal change in Table 2.2, indicate that natural increase was
16.9 million during the 1980s compared to 24.6 million in the 1950s,
a decline of 31 percent. Such trends suggest that population growth
in the United States will be increasingly dependent on immigration
from other nations. In addition, the origin of immigrants to the
United States have shifted from Europe and other developed west-
ern nations of the world during the last few decades of the last
century and the first decades of this century to Mexico, South and
Central America, and Asia during the most recent decades (Bouvier
and Gardner, 1986).
The data in Tables 2.3 and 2.4 show patterns for the three
demographic components both over time (Table 2.3) and by age
(Table 2.4). The patterns by age are critical to understanding the
impacts of these processes, because the wide variability in the rates
for these processes by age can lead to substantial changes in the
number of vital events and in the number of migrants, even if the
rates by age have shown relatively little change.

50. Table
2.2:
Components
of
Population
Olange
for
the
United
States,
1940-1990
(numbers
In
thousands)
Population
Natura
I
Percent
of
Net
Percent
of
Change
Increase
Increase
Immigration
Increase
Total
Previous
Previous
from
Natural
Previous
from
Net
Year
Population
Decade
Decade
Increase
Decade
Immigration
1940
131,669
1950
151,326
19,657
13,791
70.2
5,866
29.8
1960
179,323
27,997
24,635
88.0
3,362
12.0
1970
203,302
23,979
20,448
85.3
3,531
14.7
1980
226,546
23,244
13,999
60.2
9,245
39.8
1990
248,710
22,164
16,893
76.2
5,271
23.8
Souru:
Population
values
for
1940-1980
from
the
Census
of
Population
for
selected
years.
Population
values
for
1990
from
United
States
Department
of
Commerce,
Bureau
of
the
Census.
Population
Trends
and
Congressional
Apportion-
ment,•
1990
Census
Profile
No.1,
Washington,
DC:
U.S.
Government
Printing
Office,
1991.
Estimates
of
components
of
population
change
for
1940-50,
1950-60,
and
1960-70
from
Bogue,
D.J.
The
Population
of
the
United
States.
New
York:
Free
Press,
1985.
Estimates
of
components
of
population
change
for
1970-80,
•
United
States
Department
of
Com-
merce,
Bureau
of
the
Census.
Cumnt
Population
Reports,
P-25,
No.
1023,
Washington,
DC:
U.S.
Government
Printing
Office,
1989.
Components
of
change
for
1980
to
1990
computed
using
data
from
United
States
Department
of
Com-
merce,
Bureau
of
the
Census.
Current
Population
Reports,
P-25,
No.
1044,
Washington,
DC:
U.S.
Government
Printing
Office,
1989
and
from
Monthly
Vital
Statistic
Report,
Vol.
39,
No.12,
Washington
DC:
National
Center
for
Health
Statis-
tics,
April,
1991.
~

51. 30
Table 2.3: Birth, Death, and Net Migration Measures• for the
United States, 1940-1990
Year
1940
1950
1960
1970
1980
1990
Year
1940
1950
1960
1970
1980
1990
Year
1940
1950
1960
1970
1980
1988
Crude
Birth
Rate
19.4
24.1
23.7
18.4
15.9
16.7
Crude
Death
Rate
10.8
9.6
9.5
9.5
8.1
8.6
Annual
Number of
Immigrants
70,756
249,187
265,798
438,000
530,639
643,025
Fertility Measures
General
Fertility
Rate
79.9
106.2
118 .8
87.9
68.4
71.1
Total
Fertility
Rate
2.3
3.1
3.7
2.5
1. 8
1.9
Mortality Measures
Infant
Morta 1i ty
Rate
54.9
33.0
27.0
21. 4
12.9
9.1
Life
Expectancy
at Birth (yrs.)
62.9
68.2
69.7
70.8
13.1
75.0
Migration Measures
Year
50-51
60-61
70-71
80-81
85-86
Total Percent
Involved in
Internal
Migration
5.6
6.3
6.5
6.2
6.7
*For definitions of these rates, See Chapter 4
Source: Birth and death data from the National Center for
Health Statistics for the respective years. Migration
data for 1940-1980 from Bogue, D.J. The Population of
the United States, New York: Free Press, 195. Data for
1988 for migration from United States Department of
Commerce, Bureau of the Census. Current Population
Reports, P-25, No. 1057, Washington, DC: U.S. Gov-
ernment Printing Office, 1990. Values for 1990 com-
puted using data from Current Population Reports, P-25,
No. 1018.

52. Table 2.4: Age-S~ Birth, Death, and Migration
Rates In the United States for Selected
Years
1980 1990
Age Birth Rate Birth Rate
10-14 1. 1 0.8
15-19 53.0 49.3
20-24 115.1 105.5
25-29 112.9 110.9
30-34 61.9 72.3
35-39 19.8 26.0
40-44 3.9 5.0
45-49 0.2 0.2
1980 1990
Age Death Rate Death Rate
1 year 12.9 9.4
1-.4 0.6 0.5
5-14 0.3 0.2
15-24 1. 2 1.0
25-34 1.4 1.4
35-44 2.3 2.2
45-54 5.8 4.7
55-64 13.5 11.8
65-74 29.9 26.2
75-84 66.9 61.4
85+ 159.8 149.7
1985-86
Age Migration Rate
1-4 9. 1
5-9 6.7
10-14 5. 1
15-19 6.5
20-24 13. 1
25-29 12.5
30-34 8.1
35-44 6.0
45-54 4.0
55-64 3.5
65-74 2.0
aAll rates are per 1,000 persons. Rates for 1990 as projected In
Current Population Reports, Series P-25, No. 1018.
Source: Birth and death rates from the National Center for
Health Statistics for the respective years. Migration rates
from United States Department of Commerce, Bureau of
the Census. Current Population Reports P-20, No. 425.
Washington, DC: U.S. Government Printing Office, 1988.
31

53. 32
The fertility rates in Table 2.3 clearly show that fertility
peaked during the baby-boom decades of the 1950s and 1960s and
declined substantially by 1980. Although the rates for 1990 suggest
that fertility rates increased during the 1980s, the rates for 1990 are
still substantially lower than those in 1960 or 1970.
Mortality measures indicate that mortality has declined and
life expectancy increased during the last several decades. The crude
death rate has declined by 20 percent, the infant mortality rate has
declined by more than 80 percent, and life expectancy has increased
by 12 years since 1940.
Finally, the data on migration in this table point to an in-
creasing level of international immigration and to a continuing, rela-
tively high incidence of internal migration within the United States.
The age-specific rates in Table 2.4 show how sensitive each
of the three demographic processes is to age differences. Fertility
rates reach their peak between the ages of 20 and 30. Although
rates for those over 30 have increased substantially in recent years,
the birth rate is still highest in the age groups under 30 years of age
and declines thereafter. Death rates show a pattern sometimes
referred to as the age-curve of mortality, with relatively high death
rates occurring among persons under one-year of age, followed by
relatively low rates through ages 35-44. Mortality then begins to in-
crease so that between the ages of 55 and 64 mortality is again as
high as during infancy and then increases sharply in older age
groups. Finally, the data in Table 2.4 show that migration is, like
fertility, concentrated in the young adult years.
These age-specific patterns suggest that populations with
large proportions of their populations in their young adult years will
tend to have high levels of migration and fertility and relatively low
levels of mortality, while aging populations will show increased
levels of mortality and reduced fertility and migration. The high
levels of population growth and mobility during the 1960s and
1970s, and to some extent, the 1980s were promoted by the relative-
ly young age structure of the population resulting from the large
size of the baby-boom cohort born during 1946 to 1964. Given the
much smaller size of succeeding cohorts, the future seems likely to
bring patterns of reduced fertility, lower mobility, and increased
mortality.
Population Distribution
Knowledge of how a population is distributed is of critical
importance for understanding the distribution of population-related

54. Table
2.5:
Population
of
the
United
States,
Regions,
Divisions,
and
States,
1900-1990
United
States/
Population
(in
thousands)a
Regions
and
Divisions/
States
1990
1980
1970
1960
1950
1900
United
States
248,710
226,546
203,302
179,323
151,326
76,212
Regions
and
Divisions
Northeast
50,109
.9,135
.9,061
H,671
39,71
21,0.7
New
England
13,207
12,348
11,847
10,509
9,314
5,592
Middle
Atlantic
37,602
36,787
37,213
34,168
30,164
15,455
llidwest
59,669
51,166
56,590
51,619
H,61
26,333
East
North
Central
42,009
41,
682
40,263
36,225
30,399
15,986
West
North
Central
17,660
17,183
16,328
15,394
14,061
10,347
South
15,..6
75,372
62,113
5.,973
.7,197
2.,52.
South
Atlantic
43,567
36,959
30,679
25,972
21,182
10,443
East
South
Central
15,176
14,666
12,808
12,050
11,477
7,548
West
South
Central
26,703
23,747
19,326
16,951
14,538
6,532
West
52,716
.3,172
3.,131
21,053
20,
190
.,309
Mountain
13,659
ll,
373
8,290
6,855
5,075
1,675
Pacific
39,127
31,800
26,548
21,
198
15,
115
2,634
States
by
Division
New
England
Maine
1,228
1,125
994
969
914
694
New
Hampshire
1,
109
921
738
607
533
412
Vermont
563
511
445
390
378
344
Massachusetts
6,016
5,737
5,689
5,149
4,691
2,805
Rhode
Island
1,003
947
950
859
792
429
Connecticut
3,287
3,
108
3,032
2,535
2,007
908
(continues)
CJ.
CJ.

55. ~
Table
2.5
(rontinued)
United
States/
Population
(in
thousands)a
Regions
and
Divisions/
States
1990
1980
1970
1960
1950
1900
lliddle
Atlantic
New
York
17,990
17,558
18,
241
16,782
14,830
7,269
New
Jersey
7,730
7,365
7,171
6,067
4,835
1,884
Pennsylvania
11,
882
11,864
11,801
11,319
10,498
6,302
Hast
North
Central
Ohio
10,847
10,798
10,657
9,706
7,947
4,
158
Indiana
5,544
5,490
5,195
4,662
3,934
2,516
Illinois
11,
431
11,427
11,
110
10,081
8,712
4,822
Michigan
9,295
9,262
8,882
7,823
6,372
2,421
Wisconsin
4,892
4,706
4,418
3,952
3,435
2,069
West
North
Central
Minnesota
4,375
4,076
3,806
3,414
2,982
1,751
Iowa
2,777
2,914
2,825
2,758
2,621
2,232
Missouri
5,
117
4,917
4,678
4,320
3,955
3,
107
North
Dakota
639
653
618
632
620
319
South
Dakota
696
691
666
681
653
402
Nebraska
1,578
1,570
1,485
1,411
1,326
1,066
Kansas
2,478
2,364
2,249
2,179
1,905
1,470
(amtinues)

56. Table
2.5
(amtinuetl)
United
States/
Population
(in
thousands)a
Regions
and
Divisions/
States
1990
1980
1970
1960
1950
1900
South
Atlantic
Delaware
666
594
548
446
318
185
Maryland
4,781
4,217
3,924
3,101
2,343
1,188
District
of
Columbia
607
638
757
764
802
279
Virginia
6,187
5,347
4,651
3,967
3,319
1,854
West
Virginia
1,793
1,950
1,744
1,860
2,006
959
North
Carolina
6,629
5,882
5,084
4,556
4,062
1,894
South
Carolina
3,487
3,122
2,591
2,383
2,
117
1,340
Georgia
6,478
5,463
4,588
3,943
3,445
2,216
Florida
12,938
9,746
6,791
4,952
2,771
529
Baal
South
Central
Kentucky
3,685
3,661
3,221
3,038
2,945
2,147
Tennessee
4,877
4,591
3,926
3,567
3,292
2,021
Alabama
4,041
3,894
3,444
3,267
3,062
1,829
Mississippi
2,573
2,521
2,217
2,178
2,179
1,551
Weal
South
Central
Arkansas
2,351
2,286
1,923
1,786
1,910
1,312
Louisiana
4,220
4,206
3,645
3,257
2,684
1,382
Oklahoma
3,
146
3,025
2,559
2,328
2,233
790
Texas
16,987
14,229
11,
199
9,580
7
,711
3,049
(continues)
~

57. Table
2.5
(amtinued)
United
States/
Population
(in
thousands)a
Regions
and
Divisions/
States
1990
1980
1970
1960
1950
1900
llo-tain
Montana
799
787
694
675
591
243
Idaho
1,007
944
713
667
589
162
Wyoming
454
470
332
330
291
93
Colorado
3,294
2,890
2,210
1,754
1,325
540
New
Mexico
1,515
1,303
1,017
951
681
195
Arizona
3,665
2,718
1,775
1,302
750
123
Utah
1,723
1,461
1,059
891
689
277
Nevada
1,202
800
489
285
160
42
Pacific
Washington
4,867
4,132
3,413
2,853
2,379
518
Oregon
2,842
2,633
2,092
1,769
1,521
414
Ca
Ii
forni
a
29,760
23,668
19,971
15,717
10,586
1,485
Alaska
550
402
303
226
129
64
Hawaii
1,108
965
770
633
500
154
~otals
shown
are
derived
from
unrounded
values.
Source:
United
States
Department
of
Commerce,
Bureau
of
the
Census.
PopuJatton
Trends
and
Congressional
Appor-
tionment,•
1990
Census
Profile
No.
1,
Washington,
DC:
U.S.
Government
Printing
Office,
March,
1991.
~

58. Table
2.6:
Population
Change
in
the
United
States,
Regions
and
Divisions,
1960-1990
Change
in
Population
Number
(in
thousands)
Percent
1980
1970
1960
1980
1970
1960
United
States/
to
to
to
to
to
to
Regions
and
Divisions
1990
1980
1970
1990
1980
1970
-
United
States
22,16'
23,2·H
23,979
9.1
11.f
13.t
Kegions
and
Divisions
Northeast
1,674'
75
f,313
3.f
0.2
9.1
New
England
858
501
1,338
7.0
4.2
12.7
Middle
Atlantic
815
-426
3,045
2.2
-1.
1
8.9
Midwest
803
2,275
t,971
1.f
4.0
9.6
East
North
Central
327
1,419
4,038
0.8
3.5
11.
1
West
North
Central
476
856
933
2.8
5.2
6.1
South
10,074'
12,559
7,140
13.f
20.0
14.3
South
Atlantic
6,608
6,280
4,707
17.9
20.5
18.1
East
South
Central
510
1,858
758
3.5
14.5
6.3
West
South
Central
2,956
4,421
2,375
12.4
22.9
14.0
West
9,614'
1,334
6,715
22.3
23.9
24.2
Moun
ta
in
2,286
3,083
1,435
20.1
37.2
20.9
Pacific
7,328
5,251
5,350
23.0
19.8
25.2
Source:
Population
Trends
and
Congressional
Apportionment,•
1990
Census
Profile
No.
1,
U.S.
Bureau
of
the
Census,
Washington,
DC:
U.S.
Government
Printing
Office,
March,
1991.
()
'I

59. 38
effects. Within the United States, population redistribution has been
nearly a continuous process since the founding of the Nation. As is
evident in Tables 2.5 and 2.6, recent decades have brought patterns
of more rapid growth and inmigration to the western and southern
parts of the United States and reduced growth and outmigration
from the northeastern and midwestern parts of the United States.
During the 1970s, the population of the Northeast increased by only
0.2 percent, the population of the Midwest by 4.0 percent, the
South's by 20.0 percent, and the West's by 23.9 percent. Similarly
in the 1980s, the population of the Northeast increased by 3.4
percent, that in the Midwest by 1.4 percent, that in the South by
13.4 percent, and that in the West by 22.3 percent. The growth of
the West has been particularly dramatic, with its population increas-
ing from 4.3 million persons in 1900 to 52.8 million in 1990--an
increase of more than 1,100 percent.
A few states have played a major role in recent patterns of
population growth. California, Texas, and Florida together account-
ed for 42 percent of all population growth in the United States from
1970 to 1980 and for 54 percent of all growth from 1980 to 1990. By
1990 nearly 12 percent of all Americans lived in California, and
California, New York, Texas, and Florida together were the homes
of nearly 1 out of every 3 persons in the United States.
Tables 2.7 and 2.8 present data on the distribution of the
population according to two other widely used geographical catego-
ries. The data in Table 2.7 show how the population of the Nation
has increasingly shifted from rural to urban residences, from 44
percent of persons living in rural areas and nearly 25 percent living
on farms in 1940 to 26 percent living in rural areas and only 2.5
percent living on farms in 1980. Similarly, the proportion of non-
metropolitan residents has declined from 44 percent of the popula-
tion in 1950 to less than 23 percent in 1990 (Table 2.8). Oearly, the
distribution of the population of the United States has changed
substantially during the past half century.
Age and Sex Characteristics
The age and sex composition of the population affects the
demand for goods and services by affecting the level and types of
demands of the population. Tables 2.9 through 2.11 provide data on
these characteristics for the population of the United States.

60. Table
2.7:
Population
and
Percentage
of
Population
in
the
United
States
by
Urban,
Rural,
Rural
Farm,
and
Rural
Nonfarm
Residence,
1930-1980
Population
Percentage
of
Population
Total
Rural
Rural
Rural
Rural
Year
Population
Urban
Rural
Farm
Non
farm
Urban
Rural
Farm
Non
farm
1930
122,775,046
68,954,823
53,820,223
30,157,513
23,662,710
56.2
43.8
24.5
19.3
1940
131,669,275
74,423,702
57,245,573
30,216,188
27,029,385
56.5
43.5
22.9
20.6
1950a
150,697,361
96,467,686
54,229,675
23,048,350
31,181,325
64.0
36.0
15.3
20.7
1960b
178,466,732
124,714,055
53,752,677
13,431,791
40,320,886
69.9
30.1
7.5
22.6
1970
203,212,877
149,334,020
53,878,857
10,588,534
43,290,323
73.5
26.5
5.2
21.
3
1980c
226,545,805
167,054,638
59,491,167
5,617,903
53,873,264
73.7
26.3
2.5
23.8
a1950
census
definitions
of
urban-rural
and
rural
farm
and
nonfarm.
The
total
population
as
reported
here
for
1950
ls
different
than
in
previous
tables
because
data
in
previous
tables
reflect
post-1950
corrections
while
data
on
rural
and
urban
populations
are
available
only
for
the
count
values
shown
here.
b1960
census
definitions
of
urban-rural
and
rural
farm
and
nonfarm.
c1980
census
definitions
of
urban-rural
and
rural
farm
and
nonfarm.
Source:
Data
were
obtained
from
the
U.S.
Census
of
Population
and
Housing
(United
States
Department
of
Commerce,
Bureau
of
the
Census,
1930-1980).
~

61. Table
2.8:
Proportion
of
U.S.
Population
that
is
Metropolitan
and
Nonmetropolitan,
1950-1990
1950
1960
1970
1980
1990
Metropolitan
56.1
63.0
68.6
74.8
77.5
Nonmetropolitan
43.9
37.0
31.4
25.2
22.5
Source:
Metropolitan
and
Nonmetropolitan
Values
for
1950-1980
from
Bogue,
D.J.
The
Populatkm
of
tire
United
States,
New
York:
Free
Press,
1985.
Values
for
1990
from
U.S.
Bureau
of
the
Census
Press
Release
CB-91-66,
Washington,
OC,
April
1991.
~