Aryana Noroozi
Note: the U.S. Census Bureau writes that they “refer to the Hispanic or Latino population as the Hispanic population.” In this article, Black Voice News refers to the population as Latinx.
In 2010, 17.1 million children were of Latinx origin in the U.S. By 2020, that number rose to 18.8 million, with one in every four children in the nation being of Latinx origin.
While younger than the non-Latinx population, the Latinx population has aged faster over the past decade, according to recently released 2020 Census data.
Despite the Latinx population aging faster over the past decade compared to non-Latinx groups, in 2020, children of Latinx origin comprised a quarter of all children under age 18 in the nation. Additionally, in states where the number of Latinx children increased the most, data shows that the total population of children in those states often decreased.
The Latinx population’s median age was 30 in 2020, an increase of nearly three years from 2010. The non-Latinx population were older, but aged at a slower rate, with the median age being 41 in 2020, up 1.5 years from 2010.
Over the decade, more than 100,000 Latinx children were counted in New Jersey and Florida. The Census Bureau reported that Florida indicated the largest increase across all states, with the addition of over a quarter million Latinx children to its population from 2010 to 2020.
In three of these five states (Connecticut, New Jersey and Rhode Island), the total number of children declined between 2010 and 2020 while the number of Latinx children increased.
The states that had the largest percentage point increase in their proportion of Latinx children over the decade include: Connecticut (up 6.5); Maryland (up 6.5); Rhode Island (up 6.2); New Jersey (up 5.9); and Florida (up 4.9).
California and the Inland Region
On the contrary, California’s Latinx child population decreased 1.9 percentage points from 2010 to 2020, from 50.9 percent to 49 percent. San Bernardino and Riverside faced similar decreases in the same period; San Bernardino (down 2.5) decreased from 61 percent to 58.5 percent while Riverside (down 1.5) decreased from 59.4 to 57.9 percent.
