America's face evolves, blurs, ages

USA TODAY, August, 2008 by Paul Overberg and Emily Bazar

The number of minorities in the USA is growing so briskly that non-Hispanic whites will lose their majority status in 2042, years before demographers had previously projected, according to Census data released today.

The population is surging on almost all fronts, the new figures show. There will be 400 million people in the USA in 31 years, up from fewer than 305 million now.

The swelling numbers will transform Americans' standard of living from the environment to public schools, demographers and public policy experts say.

"It affects quality of life in very important ways," says Mark Mather, who studies U.S. demographic trends for the Population Reference Bureau, a research group in Washington. "We're already experiencing that in traffic congestion, in schools and in our crowded coastal areas."

Dramatic growth in the numbers of legal and illegal immigrants, especially Hispanics, has propelled the increase. Annual immigration this year ...