(CNN) — The growing Hispanic population in the United States has reached a new milestone, topping 50 million, or 16.3% of the nation, officially solidifying its position as the country’s second-largest group, U.S. Census Bureau officials said Thursday.
“Overall, we’ve learned that our nation’s population has become more racially and ethnically diverse over the past 10 years,” Nicholas A. Jones, chief of the bureau’s racial statistics branch, told reporters.
Several trends emerged from the 2010 census, according to Robert M. Groves, director of the census bureau, and Marc J. Perry, chief of the population distribution branch.
The country is growing at a smaller rate. Growth is concentrated in metropolitan areas and in the American West and South. The fastest-growing communities are suburbs such as Lincoln, California, outside Sacramento. And standard-bearer cities such as Boston, Baltimore and Milwaukee are no longer in the top 20 for population, replaced by upstarts such as El Paso, Texas, and Charlotte, North Carolina, the officials said.
The most significant trend, however, appeared to be the nation’s new count of 50.5 million Latinos, whose massive expansion accounted for more than half of the nation’s overall growth of 27.3 million people, to a new overall U.S. population of 308.7 million, officials said.
The Hispanic population grew 43% since 2000, officials said.
In stark contrast, all other populations together grew by only about 5%, officials said. The nation as a whole expanded by 9.7%.
Bureau officials declined Thursday to say how much illegal immigration has spurred growth among Latinos and other minorities, saying the sources of the growth are still being studied.
“Those are actually very excellent questions,” Roberto Ramirez, chief of the bureau’s ethnicity and ancestry branch, told reporters. “We are actually in the middle of the process of investigating that.”
While the white population increased by 2.2 million to 196.8 million, its share of the total population dropped to 64% from 69%, officials said.
The Asian population also grew 43%, increasing from 10.2 million in 2000 to 14.7 million in 2010, officials said. Asians now account for about 5% of the nation’s population.
The African-American population, which grew by about 4.3 million, is now about 40 million, or 12.6% of the population, a slight increase over 12.3% in 2000, officials said.
Persons reporting “some other race” grew by 3.7 million, to 19 million, or 5.5% of the nation, figures show.
“The face of the country is changing,” Jeffrey Passel, demographer at the Pew Hispanic Center, told CNN.
Demographic data had already been released for all states except New York and Maine and for the District of Columbia.
William Frey, a demographer at the Brookings Institution, said that Alabama, Tennessee, Kentucky and five other states have doubled their Hispanic populations.
In fast-growing states where whites and blacks dominated past growth, Hispanics are now the greatest growth engine, Frey said.
The significance of the numbers to the United States is more than just an increase of an ethnicity. Research shows that along with the changing demographics, the country has become more diverse in other ways, Passel said. For instance, there is a substantial mixing of the American population through interracial marriage, he said.
Another change is the concentration of the growing populations.
Previously the Hispanic population was concentrated in eight or nine states; it is now spread throughout the country, Passel said.
Frey said there is more diversity among children. Most of the data released so far show decreases in the population of white children, he said.
Minorities will have a greater presence among future generations, he said. For example, in Nevada, 61% of children are minorities, compared to 41% of adults.
In border states like Texas, demographers say, Hispanic populations are expected to surpass non-Hispanic populations within the next decade.
“Without question we are becoming a Hispanic state,” said Texas state demographer Lloyd Potter.
“I live in San Antonio, and there you see Spanish advertisements, television shows and newspapers everywhere,” he said.
In cities and towns across the region, there are Spanish-speaking restaurants, retailers, and annual festivals.
“It’s helpful to be able to speak a little Spanish if you’re non-Hispanic,” Potter said. “My neighbors don’t really speak much English. While my Spanish isn’t great, at least we can interact and be neighbors.”
But while the labor force may absorb Spanish-only employees, an emerging debate among policy makers asks whether their children face added challenges in English-speaking schools.
“Education attainment is the single best determinant for a whole variety of social outcomes,” said Steven Camarota, director of research at the Center for Immigration Studies in Washington.
Analysts speculate that while population levels swell, comparable growth in education levels may take some time.
“In New York City, Italians once had a much higher high school dropout rate,” Camarota said, noting an Italian immigration flux in the United States that spanned the years of 1890 to 1920. “It took them 60 to 70 years to lower those levels and close the socioeconomic gap.”