Did you know that Honolulu boasts one of the highest rates of people who carpool to work? Or that there are only seven metro areas in the country in which median household income rose between 2000 and 2009? That married-couple-with-children households now comprise only about one-fifth of U.S. households, compared to 40 percent in 1970? Or that immigrants and the native-born attain college degrees at the same rate? Or that the age cohort that grew the fastest this decade was 55-to-64-year olds?
If you saw the State of Metropolitan America report we released this past May, these stats may be old news to you.. It described historic demographic changes going on in our country and in particular, in our 100 largest metropolitan areas. The report covered an array of subjects, from income and poverty to transportation to immigration, aging, and educational attainment.
The State of Metropolitan America was both an advance look at the 2010 Census and a snapshot of American life, seen through a demographic lens. The resulting picture surprised many, revealing an America both increasingly diverse and divided, as great structural changes continued. These changes are taking place first and most intensely in our metropolitan areas.
Today, using newly released data from the 2009 American Community Survey, the Metropolitan Policy Program has updated its interactive mapping tool, giving users the chance to rank metros, cities, suburbs, or states on socio-economic indicators such as education, age, race, wages, or to explore a particular metro area or state in depth. The site can also be a highly useful tool for tracking and reporting on trends in our 100 largest metros, such as the relative growth in the Hispanic population, comparative levels of education, and the growth in the senior citizen population.
In addition, we’re drilling down with reports (on topics like poverty, the relationship between education and employment during the Great Recession, immigration, and domestic migration) using the most recently available data from the Census Bureau. So stay tuned. You just might learn something new. We did.