Census: Hawaii has highest share of Asians in US
Census data: Hawaii has highest share of Asians in US, lowest share of whites
HONOLULU (AP) -- A state analysis of U.S. Census data released Thursday shows Hawaii has by far the largest share of Asians and the smallest share of whites in any U.S. state's total population.
The research division of the Department of Business, Economic Development and Tourism said the data shows 56.9 percent of Hawaii's population identified as Asian, either alone or in combination with one or more races as of July 1 last year. That's by far the highest share of any state, with California ranked second at 15.8 percent.
Despite a population of just under 1.4 million, Hawaii ranks fifth in the country in its raw population of nearly 792,000 Asians.
The analysis said 43 percent of people in Hawaii identified as white, alone or in combination with another race.
Minorities made up more than three-quarters of the state's population, with only 22.8 percent of people identifying as white and not Hispanic.
Honolulu County has a higher share of minorities than other parts of Hawaii, the state analysis said. On Oahu, 80.6 percent of people identified as minorities, while 69.9 percent of people were minorities in Kauai, 69.3 percent on the Big Island and 68.4 percent in Maui County.
According to the U.S. Census, nearly 132,000 people in the state identified as Hispanic. Hispanic is defined by the Census as an ethnicity and not a race, and is tallied separately.
While Hawaii's total population increased only 2.1 percent between 2010 and 2012, the state saw bigger jumps in its older residents over the same two years, including a 12.8 percent increase in residents 85 years and older and a 12.7 percent increase in those ages 65 to 69.
State officials say 16.1 percent of the population on Kauai is age 65 or older, the highest share for the age group in the state. Kauai also has the highest median age at 41.8 years.
The median age in the state is 38.3 years, slightly down from 38.5 years in 2011, state officials said. Hawaii has slightly more men, 50.4 percent, than women.
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Oskar Garcia can be reached on Twitter at http://twitter.com/oskargarcia
