Us Census Comparison

Two groups of people I choose to research for my papers were the entire Hispanic group as well as the entire Black group (Both foreign and native born). I choose these two groups because they make up a large percentage of the minority population. Hispanics are the largest minority group with a population of 44.3 million; that's 14.8 percent of the United States population. The population of Blacks was 37 million. This was based on the United States Census bureau 2006 American Community survey.

Upon looking into these groups I found a lot of similarities. There were also some major differences. For blacks there are more Females than males, 52% compared to 47 percent however Hispanics were exactly the opposite with 52% male and 48% female. The largest age group of both the black and Hispanic population was 5 to 17 years of age with 21% for the black population and 23% for the Hispanic population. The median age for Hispanics is 27.3 where Blacks was 31.4. The age statistics were particularly interesting, the fact the larger age group was the younger population is foreshadowing the birth rates which you will see in both groups is high.

Before I get into the birth rates id like to go over the marriage statistics of both groups There are 31 million Hispanics above the age of 15 within that group 48% are currently married and 37% were never married Divorced widowed and separated made up for the other 15% of the population. For the Blacks there was a similar population of 28 million above the age of 15. However Only 31% are married and 46% are not with divorced, widowed and separated making up 23% of the rest of the population. I believe the higher trend in Hispanic marriages may be based behind there culture.

Now that you have the numbers for marriages id like to introduce the fertility statistics. The Black population has 10.4 million women ages 15 to 50 of the 10.4 million 605 thousand married Blacks have given birth in the past year and 400 thousand unmarried Blacks have given birth. That's a total of 66% of women who have given birth in the past year. For the Hispanic population there is a similar population; 11.7 million women ages 15 to 50. 873,000 of those women are married and have had children in the past 12 months. 322,000 were unmarried; the total population of those women 15 to 50 bearing children within the past 12 months is 37% far less than the African American rate. Those statistics were just what I expected to see. There are more married Hispanics than Blacks, and more married Hispanics had children then Blacks.

Educational attainment is one of the most important statistical figures it directly effects poverty and occupation statistics. Of the population ages 25 and over there are 24 millions Hispanics. Out of those 24 million 40% of them have less than a high school diploma, 30% have graduated 20% have some college or an associates degree. 8% have received a bachelor's degree and only 4% have graduates or Ph.D. Blacks have a much higher education with only 20% lacking a high school diploma. 34% have graduated high school; 28% have some college or an associate's degree, 11% have a bachelors and 6% have graduates or higher.

The difference in education was huge and I was puzzled as to why such a similar population had such differences until I got to the statistics on Language and the ability to speak English. This statistic was based on the population 5 years of age and older. There were 34.1 million blacks of them 93% could speak English as opposed to 39.5 million Hispanics and only 22% able to speak English. This was a major barrier. On top of that 39% of Hispanics spoke English at a level of less than well as compared to only 2.5% blacks. Those statistics made me question what the native and foreign born populations were between the groups.

As I disclosed earlier there are 44 million Hispanics in America. Of those 44 million 26 million of them are native to America