Study Says State’s Population Will Double by 2040; Latinos to Be 48%

By 2040, California will be twice as crowded as it is today, Latinos will be the dominant ethnic group, men will slightly outnumber women and the 80-somethings will have nearly quadrupled, state demographers predicted Thursday.

A new government report sketches a picture of the state continuing its vibrant growth and reaching a population of 58.7 million by 2040--nearly twice what it was in 1990.

The huge growth projections for the nation’s most populous state mean California governments will face unprecedented pressure to provide services and expand educational opportunities, said state Finance Department Director Craig Brown. Much of the demand will come on already overburdened transportation and water delivery systems, he said.

The growth of minorities, fueled by higher birth rates and increasing numbers of foreign immigrants, will outstrip that of whites, and the demographers predict that in 20 years Latinos will, for the first time, be the largest ethnic group in California.

Thereafter, they say, whites will lag behind other groups, falling to 31% of the population by 2040, with Latinos at 48%.

“We are probably already at the stage where we shouldn’t talk about majority and minority populations. We live in a plurality state,” said Tim Hodson, director of the Center for California Studies at Cal State Sacramento. “It’s a multiethnic state where soon no particular group will have a majority.”

The projections come from a report by a team of California Department of Finance demographers and analysts that is produced every five years. Mary Heim, who directed the study, said death and fertility rates and migration trends were used in the analysis.

For example, she said, the authors assume from recent lifestyle trends--Californians are eating better, exercising more often and generally improving their health--that life spans will increase considerably. She also said fertility rates among minorities will probably continue to be substantially higher than among whites.

Looking at individual counties, the team predicts that five more--Contra Costa, Fresno, Kern, San Joaquin and Ventura--will have populations of 1 million or more by 2040, giving California a total of 13 counties with populations over 1 million.

The fastest-growing counties, they suggest, will be Colusa, Imperial, Riverside and Madera, each doubling in size over four decades.

Only one county, San Francisco, is expected to lose population.

In Los Angeles County, Latinos are projected to become a majority by 2010 and steadily increase until they are 64% of the population in 2040. Asian-Americans are also expected to increase steadily.

By contrast, whites and African-Americans are expected to steadily decline, with the black population dwindling significantly by 2040. This shift will have profound consequences in the 2000 redistricting statewide and in City Council elections, in which Latinos are expected to pick up seats held by African-Americans.

The Latino population will remain young, while all other groups, especially whites, are expected to age considerably, according to the report.

“That could change politics,” said Bruce Cain, a UC Berkeley professor of political science, forecasting struggles between aging populations with needs substantially different from those of younger Latinos with young families.

Hodson said the disproportionate number of very old people in later decades--3.4 million over age 80 by 2040--will put a tremendous squeeze on government resources as aging baby boomers increase their demands for services.

From a political perspective, he said, the population trends show clearly that Latinos’ impact on California elections will increase. Not only is that population growing, he said, but because it is a young population the percentage that now registers to vote is small. As Latinos age, he said, they will probably follow the trends of other populations and more and more will become voters.

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California Population Trends

By 2040, California will be about twice as crowded as it was in 1990.

PROJECTED POPULATION (millions)

STATEWIDE

1990: 29.9 million

2000: 34.7 million

2010: 40 million

2020: 45.4 million

2030: 51.8 million