By Howard Koplowitz
The New York metropolitan area had a net loss of nearly half a million white people from 2000 to 2008 and minorities are projected to become a majority in the area once this year’s census is counted, according to a report released Sunday by the Brookings Institution.
The white population in the New York-Newark metropolitan area, which includes parts of New York, New Jersey and Pennsylvania, declined by 490,380 people from 2000 to 2008, based on the nonpartisan think tank’s analysis of census data.
Only the Los Angeles-Long Beach-Santa Ana, Calif., metropolitan area had a larger decrease in white residents during that span with a net loss of 662,170, the report said.
“America is on its way to becoming a much more racially and ethnically diverse country, with whites expected to account for less than half the population by 2042,” the report’s authors wrote. “The New York metro area, which clocked in at 50.7 percent white in 2008, will soon cross this threshold as well, perhaps by this year’s decennial census.”
The growth of the Asian population in the New York-Newark metropolitan area was the largest among any metropolitan area from 2000 to 2008, with 355,698 more Asians living in the area during that time.
The report also found that for the first time, all racial and ethnic groups in 93 major metropolitan areas in the country have more members living in the suburbs than in cities.
The percentage of blacks, Hispanics and Asians living in the suburbs rose by at least 4 percent from 2000 to 2008, while whites recorded only a 1.1 percentage point increase — from 76.7 percent living in the suburbs in 2000 to 77.8 percent in 2008.
Blacks had the largest increase over the span, from 43 percent of African Americans living in suburbs in 2000 to 50.5 percent in 2008.
The percentage of Hispanics living in suburbs grew from 53.7 percent in 2000 to 58.7 percent in 2008.
More than 57 percent of Asians lived in the suburbs in 2000 compared to 61.9 percent in 2008, the report found.
The report said Hurricane Katrina’s devastating impact on New Orleans in 2005 “accounted for a significant part” in the increasing trend of minorities moving to the suburbs.
“The aftermath of Hurricane Katrina contributed to a significant reduction in the city’s black population and a less-severe decline in its white population,” the report found.
Reach reporter Howard Koplowitz by e-mail at hkoplowitz@cnglocal.com or by phone at 718-260-4573.
