Fewer white Americans, more Asians and Hispanics: new census data shows US ‘changing dramatically’

The number of White people in the U.S. fell for first time since 1790, according to new data from the 2020 Census https://t.co/4RlIeSHEyZ

— The Washington Post (@washingtonpost) August 12, 2021

The country is changing dramatically,” William Frey, a demographer at the Brookings Institution, told the Washington Post earlier this week, in anticipation of the official numbers. Estimates showed the white population decline happening eight years earlier than demographers anticipated, due to “the opioid epidemic and lower-than-anticipated birth rates among millennials after the Great Recession,” he added. 

Whites are expected to fall below 50% nationally by 2045, Frey said. For now, there are 204.3 million of them, or 57.8% of the total – a decline of 8.6% since 2010. Another 31.1 million people identified as white in combination with another group.