NEW YORK, June 13 (UPI) -- The number of deaths of non-Hispanic white people in the United States exceeded the number of births in 2012, for the first time in a century, census data show.
For the year ending July 1, there were about 12,000 more deaths than births among non-Hispanic whites, a relatively small disparity, The New York Times reported Thursday.
That, coupled with the fact most births in the United States are to Hispanic, black and Asian mothers, means non-Hispanic white Americans will become a minority within about three decades, the newspaper said.
The transition means "today's racial and ethnic minorities will no longer be dependent on older whites for their economic well-being," said William H. Frey, a demographer with the Brookings Institution. "It makes more vivid than ever the fact that we will be reliant on younger minorities and immigrants for our future demographic and economic growth."
Experts had expected this change in trends, but not so soon. Kenneth M. Johnson, the senior demographer at the Carsey Institute at the University of New Hampshire blamed the shift in part on the recession.
He said there were 320,000 more non-Hispanic white births than deaths in 2006, just before the recession. From 2010 to 2011, that number shrank to 29,000.
