Demographics of California
The Demographics of California is a complex topic, which is undergoing dynamic change. As the most populous of the states, California contains large numbers of people from a wide variety of ethnic, racial, national, and religious backgrounds. The state continues to attract significant numbers of immigrants, and continues to grow dramatically in over-all size; for example, its population is twice that of New York state, which California surpassed to become the most populous state in 1962.[1][2]
California lacks a majority ethnic group, and is considered one of the "majority-minority states." Because there are many national communities and ethnic origins in the state as well, there are over 200 languages known to be spoken and read in California. Spanish is the state's second most spoken language, especially in the Los Angeles area and the US-Mexico border (San Diego and Imperial counties).
Demographers have speculated that California will have a Hispanic majority by the year 2020, due to large-scale immigration and birth rates of Hispanic immigrants increased at a faster rate than non-Hispanic groups.
California is the second most populous state in the Western Hemisphere, exceeded only by São Paulo State. More than 12 percent of U.S. citizens live in California and its population is greater than that of all but 34 countries, including the large country of Canada and the continent nation of Australia. [citation needed] If it were an independent country, California would rank 34th in population behind Poland. [citation needed]
Population
| Census | Pop. | Note | %± |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1850 | 92,597 | — | |
| 1860 | 379,994 | 310.4% | |
| 1870 | 560,247 | 47.4% | |
| 1880 | 864,694 | 54.3% | |
| 1890 | 1,213,398 | 40.3% | |
| 1900 | 1,485,053 | 22.4% | |
| 1910 | 2,377,549 | 60.1% | |
| 1920 | 3,426,861 | 44.1% | |
| 1930 | 5,677,251 | 65.7% | |
| 1940 | 6,907,387 | 21.7% | |
| 1950 | 10,586,223 | 53.3% | |
| 1960 | 15,717,204 | 48.5% | |
| 1970 | 19,953,134 | 27.0% | |
| 1980 | 23,667,902 | 18.6% | |
| 1990 | 29,760,021 | 25.7% | |
| 2000 | 33,871,648 | 13.8% |
As of 2006, California has an estimated population of 37,172,015. California is the 13th fastest-growing state. This includes a natural increase since the last census of 1,557,112 people (that is 2,781,539 births minus 1,224,427 deaths) and an increase due to net migration of 751,419 people into the state. Immigration from outside the United States resulted in a net increase of 1,415,879 people, and migration within the country produced a net increase of 564,100 people, and a decrease of 21,669. More than 12 percent of U.S. citizens live in California.
California has eight of the top 50 US cities in terms of population. Los Angeles is the nation's second largest city with a population of 3,845,541 people, followed by San Diego (8th), San Jose (10th), San Francisco (14th), Long Beach (34th), Fresno (37th), Sacramento (38th) and Oakland (44th).
The center of population of California is located in Kern County, in the town of Buttonwillow.[3]
Racial and ancestral makeup
According to the 2006 ACS Estimates, California's population is:
- 58.9% White American,
- 12.3% Asian American,
- 6.2% Black or African American,
- 0.7% American Indian,
- 3.3% mixed, and 17.3% of some other race.
- 35.9% are Hispanic or Latino (of any race).[4]
California has the largest population of White Americans in the U.S., an estimated 21,810,156 residents. The state has the fifth largest population of African Americans in the U.S., an estimated 2,260,648 residents. California's Asian population is estimated at 4.5 million, approximately one-third of the nation's 14.9 to 15.1 million Asian Americans. California's Native American population of 376,093 (but some estimates place it at one million) is the most of any state. [citation needed]
According to estimates from 2006, California has the largest minority population in the United States, making up 57% of the state population. Non-Hispanic whites decreased from 80% of the state's population in 1970 to 43% in 2006. [5] While the population of minorities accounts for 100.7 million of 300 million U.S. residents, 21% of the national total live in California.
Only New Mexico and Texas have higher percentages of Latinos, but California has the highest number of any U.S. state, and Hawaii has a higher Asian American percentage than California. But the state now ranks second in the number of Chinese and Japanese, after New York City just surpassed California as the largest communities of Chinese Americans and Japanese Americans. [citation needed]
The largest named ancestries in California are Mexican (25%), German (9%), Irish (7.7%), English (7.4%) and Filipino (6%), but includes 65 other ethnicities from Albanian to Haitian to Pakistani to Somali. Both Los Angeles and San Francisco have large numbers of French, Italian, Portuguese, Russian and Scandinavian ancestry.
Latinos/Hispanic Americans
Mexican Americans predominate in Southern California especially in Los Angeles, the city itself is said to be the largest Mexican community in the US since 1900). Also in the Imperial Valley on the US-Mexican border has the highest percentage (70-75%) of Latinos in the state, Riverside County especially in its eastern end are mostly Latino. The Central Valley (the majority of people in Madera, Fresno, Kern, Tulare and Yolo counties) and over 20% in parts of the San Francisco Bay Area like San Mateo, Napa Valley, Alameda and Santa Clara counties.
Most of the state's Latinos are of Mexican origin, but includes those of Caribbean (Cuban American and Puerto Rican), Central American (i.e. Guatemalan, Honduran, Salvadoran and Nicaraguan) and South American (i.e. Chilean, Colombian and Peruvian) groups. Latinos are the largest ethnic group in Los Angeles County at over 40 percent of the county's population, but they compose a sizable community in Bakersfield, Fresno, Sacramento, Oakland, San Jose, Long Beach, Anaheim, San Diego and Santa Ana where they compose 75 percent of the population.
Asian-Americans and Pacific Islanders
California has about 40% (or 6.7 million) of the nation's Asian American population [citation needed], the state has a long history of established Asian communities, first of Chinese since the 1850s, then Japanese descent from the 1880s and the Filipinos for over a century. A large wave of Asian immigration took place since 1965 and California was the major destination for Asian immigrants like it was before.
Chinese Americans are numerous in San Francisco, East Bay, South Bay, Sacramento, and the San Gabriel Valley region of Los Angeles County. The San Francisco Bay Area has a greater concentration of Cantonese-speaking Chinese. Southern California has perhaps the largest Taiwanese American community in the United States particularly in San Gabriel Valley, and in Cerritos, West Covina, Irvine (in Orange County), and some in the South Bay, Los Angeles Area.
Filipino Americans are particularly numerous in Los Angeles, San Francisco, San Mateo and Solano counties, and in communities such as Artesia, Baldwin Park, Cerritos, Covina, West Covina, and the community of Eagle Rock in Los Angeles. Delano near Bakersfield, the Coachella Valley, San Diego, Salinas, Stockton and Lathrop also have large Filipino populations.
There are large Korean American communities in Koreatown of Los Angeles, the eastern San Gabriel Valley, the San Fernando Valley, Cerritos/Long Beach, South Bay, Los Angeles, and in northern Orange County. There is another large Korean-American population in the San Francisco bay area, while Koreans are growing in number in the suburban Inland Empire region like Chino Hills, Corona and Desert Hot Springs.
The South Bay area and Little Tokyo have a large Japanese American community. However, Japanese Americans are also concentrated in San Francisco and across the Bay area, San Jose, the Salinas Valley, and the Bakersfield, Fresno, San Diego, San Bernardino, Santa Barbara and Sacramento areas. Despite the presence of Japanese goods stores, media outlets and restaurants in the state, most "Little Tokyos" and "Japantowns" were evacuated during the forced relocation of Japanese Americans during WWII (see Japanese American Internment).
Long Beach has one of the largest Cambodian American communities in the United States. The neighboring cities of Westminster and Garden Grove have the largest Vietnamese American community outside of Vietnam and are often dubbed "Little Saigon". Vietnamese and Cambodian immigrants also settled down in the San Francisco Bay area (esp. San Jose, Santa Clara and Sunnyvale) and across the San Joaquin Valley. And over 6,000 Laotian Americans live in the Fresno area, the largest of its' kind.
Most of the Indian Americans reside in Los Angeles Metropolitan Area ,and San Francisco Bay Area. The Los Angeles-area cities of Artesia and Cerritos, as well as the Bay Area city of Fremont has a large Indian community. San Jose and other Silicon Valley cities also have a large number. Also large Indian populations are in Central Valley cities such as Stockton, Bakersfield, Fresno, and Yuba City, and the Imperial Valley. The majority came from India, but encompasses those from other South Asian countries like Pakistan, Bangladesh and Sri Lanka.
California is home to over 100,000 Pacific Islanders, the majority (80,000) are Native Hawaiians of any measurable Polynesian ancestry (most are part-Asian, some are part-white or other races) arrived from Hawaii for over a century. Also 25,000 Samoans originally from American Samoa or Western Samoa, mostly live in Long Beach and L.A. suburbs of Carson, Artesia/Cerritos, Redondo Beach. There are 10,000 Chamorros from Guam and Northern Mariana Islands in Northern California, the largest Micronesian community in the mainland US, and an estimated 10,000 Tahitians from Tahiti part of French Polynesia live in Southern California. [citation needed]
European and Middle Eastern-Americans
California has the largest population of European Americans of any state. In 2000, California also had the largest number of Bulgarian Americans in any U.S. state and also the most Hungarian Americans of any U.S. state. California also has one of the largest numbers of Armenian Americans at 600,000 (esp. the large Armenian community in Glendale). Los Angeles and San Francisco have large Russian American populations, and have a long history of small ethnic communities such as Irish (being the largest ancestry group), Italians, Greeks, Germans and Poles, descendants of late 19th century immigration.
There are an estimated 500,000 Iranian Americans in Southern California including 20% of Beverly Hills.[6] But, Iranian communities also flourish in the San Fernando Valley, Orange County, the Palm Springs area and the San Joaquin Valley. The majority came after the oust of the pro-U.S. Shah regime of Iran in the late 1970s.
The state also has over 500,000 Arab Americans, with large communities in Alameda, Fresno, Imperial, Kern, Orange, San Diego and Stanislaus counties. A great percentage came from Egypt, Iraq, Jordan, Lebanon and Syria, but in the mid-20th century a pattern of agricultural migrant labor of Middle Eastern background appeared in the Coachella Valley.[citation needed]
Black or African Americans
California has the largest population of African Americans in the western U.S., an estimated 2.1 million residents. Large African American communities are in Compton, Fairfield, Inglewood, Los Angeles, Long Beach, Oakland, Richmond, Sacramento, San Bernardino, and Vallejo. Also Bakersfield, Berkeley, Fresno, Riverside, San Diego, San Francisco and Stockton also have sizable black populations.
African Americans are approximately 7 percent of the state population, with many of them living in suburban communities, especially in the Inland Empire (Riverside-San Bernardino and Palm Springs areas), the High Desert north of Los Angeles (Palmdale and Victorville), and across the San Joaquin Valley (Stockton, Sacramento, Fresno and Bakersfield areas).
Native Americans/American Indians
California's Native American population of 376,000 is the most of any state. It also has the most Native American tribes (indigenous to the state or not) but the majority of known Californian Indian tribes became extinct in the late 19th century. The US Census includes Latin American Indian, esp. immigrants belonged to indigenous peoples or have Amerindian heritage of Central and South America. The majority of Mexican-Americans indicated to possessed some indigenous (Native Californian) heritage. [citation needed]
The Cherokee Nation is the largest tribe in the state with a population of 110,000, although the number of Cherokee descendants may surpass 500,000. They are often descendants of Dust Bowl refugees in the 1930s and 1940's who migrated to the state's farming counties and urban areas for jobs. Cherokees tend to congregate in Los Angeles/Long Beach, Bakersfield, Fresno, Oakland/San Francisco, San Diego and Sacramento. [citation needed]
California also has significant populations of the Apache, Choctaw, Creek, Hopi, Zuni, Navajo, Blackfeet, Shoshone, Paiute, Pueblos and Chumash tribes. In the inland southern areas, local tribal nations own and operate successful gaming and casino enterprises which promote tribal economic self-sufficiency and provide entertainment for the communities they serve.[citation needed]And the Los Angeles area is said to have the largest Native American population of any US metro area. [citation needed]
Languages
As of 2000, 60.5% of California residents age 5 and older speak English at home and 25.8% speak Spanish. Chinese is the third most spoken language at 2.6%, followed by Tagalog at 2.0% and Vietnamese at 1.3%.[7] Over 200 languages are known to be spoken and read in California, with Spanish used as the state's "alternative" language.
The indigenous languages of California number more than one hundred and show great diversity making California one of the most linguistically diverse areas in the world. All of California's indigenous languages are endangered, although there are now efforts toward language revitalization.[8]
Since 1986, the California Constitution has specified that English is the common and official language of the state. The politics of language is a major political issue in the state, especially in regard to language policy controlling the teaching and official use of immigrant languages.
Religion
In pure numbers, the state has the most Roman Catholics in the U.S. ahead of New York state and the largest Mormon population outside of Utah according to The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. [9] The state has a large American Jewish community (the largest in the western US), esp. concentrated in Los Angeles, Beverly Hills, San Francisco, Oakland, Sacramento and Palm Springs; and a rapidly-growing Islamic population with large Muslim communities in west Los Angeles, San Diego, Orange County, Santa Clara County, and the Modesto area.
A large majority of California's Roman Catholic membership are of Irish, Italian, Mexican, Filipino ancestry. The population of Catholic Californians is rapidly growing due to the influx of Latin American and Filipino immigrants. In the state, Catholicism is higher represented in non-Hispanic whites, but lesser represented in African-Americans/non-Hispanic blacks, and Protestantism is the majority Christian denomination in non-Hispanic black, white and Asian-American groups.
There's a thriving number of new age, cult movements, and Eastern religions like Hinduism, Buddhism, Shintō, Sikhism, and Taoism that symbolize California as a progressive place for theological innovation since the 1960s, while the Eastern religions were partly introduced by Asian immigrants when they settled in the state.
As the twentieth century came to a close, forty percent of all Buddhists in America resided in Southern California. The Los Angeles Metropolitan Area has become unique in the Buddhist world as the only place where representative organizations of every major school of Buddhism can be found in a single urban center.[citation needed] The City of Ten Thousand Buddhas in Northern California and Hsi Lai Temple in Southern California are two of the largest Buddhist temples in the Western Hemisphere. It also has a growing Hindu population. [citation needed]
The largest Christian denominations by number of adherents in 2000 were the Roman Catholic Church with 10,079,310; The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints with 529,575; and the Southern Baptist Convention with 471,119. Jewish congregations had 994,000 adherents.
The state has the most Roman Catholics of any state and a large Protestant population, a large American Jewish community, and an American Muslim population.
With a Jewish population estimated at more than 550,000, Los Angeles has the second-largest Jewish community in North America.
California also has the largest Muslim community population in the United States, an estimated 3.4 percent of the population, mostly residing in Southern California. According to figures, approximately 100,000 Muslims reside in San Diego.
California has more members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and Temples than any state except Utah. Latter-day Saints (Mormons) have played important roles in the settlement of California throughout the state's history. For example, a group of a few hundred Mormon converts from the Northeastern United States and Europe arrived at what would become San Francisco in the 1840s aboard the ship Brooklyn, more than doubling the population of the small town. Before being called back to Utah by Brigham Young these settlers helped build up the city of Yerba Buena. A group of Mormons also established the city of San Bernardino in Southern California in 1851. According to the LDS Church 2007 statistics, just over 750,000 Mormons reside in the state of California, attending almost 1400 congregations statewide.
The religious affiliations of the people of California:[10]
- Protestant – 33%
- Baptist – 4%
- Presbyterian – 3%
- Methodist – 2%
- Roman Catholic – 31%
- LDS – 2%
- Jewish – 2%
- Muslim – 1%
- other Religions – 4%
- non-Religious – 21%
However, a Pew Research Center survey revealed that California is less religious than the rest of America: 62% of Californians say they are "absolutely certain" of the belief in God, while in the nation 71% say so. The survey also revealed 48% of Californians say religion is "very important", while the figure for America is 56%. [11]
See also
References
- ^ http://www.publicaffairs.water.ca.gov/dwr50thanniversary/flood/historic.cfm
- ^ Governor Edmund G. "Pat" Brown of California
- ^ Population center of California.
- ^ US Census Bureau
- ^ The Best Story of Our Lives
- ^ Montagne, Renee (2006-06-08). "Living in Tehrangeles: L.A.'s Iranian Community". National Public Radio. Retrieved 2006-06-28.
- ^ "Detailed List of Languages Spoken at Home for the Population 5 Years and Over by State: 2000" (PDF). 2000 United States Census. United States Census Bureau. 2003. Retrieved April 11.
{{cite web}}: Check date values in:|accessdate=(help); Unknown parameter|accessyear=ignored (|access-date=suggested) (help) - ^ The following are a list of the indegenous languages: Root languages of California: Athabaskan Family: Hupa, Mattole, Lassik, Wailaki, Sinkyone, Cahto, Tolowa, Nongatl, Wiyot, Chilula; Hokan Family: Pomo, Shasta, Karok, Chimiriko; Algonquian Family: Whilkut, Yurok; Yukian Family: Wappo; Penutian Family: Modok, Wintu, Nomlaki, Konkow, Maidu, Patwin, Nisenan, Miwok, Coast Miwok, Lake Miwok, Ohlone, Northern Valley Yokuts, Southern Valley Yokuts, Foothill Yokuts; Hokan Family: Esselen, Salinan, Chumash, Ipai, Tipai, Yuma, Halchichoma, Mohave; Uto-Aztecan Family: Mono Paiute, Monache, Owens Valley Paiute, Tubatulabal, Panamint Shoshone, Kawaisu, Kitanemuk, Tataviam, Gabrielino, Juaneno, Luiseno, Cuipeno, Cahuilla, Serrano, Chemehuevi
- ^ "Country profiles of LDS statistics".
- ^ U.S. Religion Map and Religious Populations - U.S. Religious Landscape Study - Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life
- ^ http://pewforum.org/religion08/state.php?StateID=18
