The U.S. Census Bureau’s announcement that the country’s population grew 7.4% over the past decade to 331,449,281 may seem like significant growth — but in reality, it represents the second-lowest decade-to-decade growth rate since the U.S. Census began in 1790, behind only the stagnant growth of the 1930s during the Great Depression. …
No one can predict with certainty the future trajectory of the U.S. population growth rate. While Americans’ aging population points to future population decline, that could be offset by future political, medical and social factors that influence the key variables of births, deaths, immigration and emigration.
But, importantly for my interests here, there is an attitudinal component that affects these variables, and I’ll look briefly at these in the sections that follow. CONTINUED
Frank Newport, Gallup