SALT LAKE CITY (AP) - New data from the U.S. Census Bureau shows Utah is experiencing a growing wave of diversity and Asian and multiracial population are growing faster than others.
The state’s Asian and multiracial populations both grew by 6 percent between 2015 and 2016 - faster than any other racial or ethnic group, according to the data released Thursday.
More than 1 in 5 Utah residents is now a racial or ethnic minority, including more than 1 in 4 under the age of 18, the census bureau said.
“These trends are cumulative and ongoing and irreversible,” said Pam Perlich, director of demographic research at the Kem C. Gardner Policy Institute at the University of Utah. “The great wave of diversity that is our youth will become the great wave of diversity that is our adults, and then our old folks. It’s the new Utah.”
The growth of the Asian community in Utah is due mostly to an influx of often highly educated immigrants from Asia, Perlich said.
“We’re at this point that Utah is in a global competition for talent, and that pathway between us and the folks in Asia has opened up,” Perlich said.
The growth in the number of multiracial Utah residents is due largely to births, she said.
Of the 61,000 Utahns who are biracial or multiracial, more than half are under the age of 18, according to the census data.
The Asian population in Utah has jumped by 34 percent over the past six years. The number of multiracial Utah residents grew by 31 percent, the census information stated.
The non-Hispanic white population showed the slowest growth of 8 percent, while the Hispanic population grew by 17 percent, the Deseret News reported (https://bit.ly/2t5ZaIm ).
In terms of raw numbers, the Asian and multiracial communities in Utah remain small. Together they account for just 4 percent of the population, whereas Hispanic residents make up 14 percent of the population and non-Hispanic white residents make up 79 percent.
Census data now shows 21 percent of Utah residents - about 537,500 people - are racial or ethnic minorities.
San Juan County, where Utah’s portion of the Navajo Nation Reservation is located, has the highest percentage of minorities at 57 percent. Salt Lake County and Weber County have the next highest percentage of minorities - 28 percent and 24 percent, respectively.
The Census Bureau also found that Utah continues to have the lowest median age in the U.S., at 30.8 years.
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