Tourism|__|News|__|Sports|__|Scores|__|Lifestyles|
Golden Years|__|Living off the Land|__|Subscribe Enterprise|
Advertising|__|Alpine Avalanche|__|Monahans News|__|E-Forum|__|Lotto
Links|__|Photos|__|Archives|__|Classified|__|ENTERPRISE HOME PAGE
Van Horn Advocate
Every year until the middle of the next century Hispanics are expected
to add more people to the U.S. population than any other single ethnic
group.
By five years into the next century Hispanics will be the nation's
second-largest ethnic group, behind only Whites. Hispanics will be the
largest ethnic group in California by 2025, making up almost 45 percent
of that state's population.
As a race, U.S. Hispanics are young with about half their population
under 26.5 years old, compared to Whites who have a median age of about
37.3 years.
More than half of U.S. Hispanics older than 25 years have at least a
high school diploma and almost 10 percent have earned at least a
bachelor's degree. Hispanic high school graduates have increased by
seven percent since 1983. About 54,000 Hispanics 25 and older have Ph.
D.s, more than 71,000 have professional degrees.
In the 1994-95 school year, 12 percent of Hispanic high school students
in grades 10 - 12 dropped out of school, but about 25 percent of
Hispanics between the ages of 18 and 21 were attending college in 1995.
In 1995, the average Hispanic family income was about the same as that
of African Americans, between $22,000 and $23,000, compared to the
median White family income of $37,178. Hispanics and African Americans
had a poverty rate of more than 30 percent compared to a White poverty
rate of less than nine percent.
About 30 percent of Hispanic men work as operators, fabricators or
laborers and 19 percent work in precision production, craft and repair
jobs. Almost 40 percent of Hispanic women work in technical, sales, or
administrative support jobs and 19 percent work in service jobs.
Overall, Hispanics have an 11 percent unemployment rate compared to six
percent for Whites.
In March 1995, 54 percent of Hispanic men and 57 percent of Hispanic
women older than 15 years were married. Nearly 63 percent of Hispanic
children less than 18 years old lived with both parents and 28 percent
lived with their mother only, four percent with their father only and
four percent with neither parent.
Married couples made up 68 percent of Hispanic families in 1996 and
another 26 percent of Hispanic families were headed by a woman with no
husband.
An average Hispanic family has almost four people compared with about
three people in all families. About 64 percent (or 4 million) Hispanic
families include children. Families with children have an average of 2.2
children . Almost 30 percent of these families had three or more
children.
In 1996, the total foreign-born population of the U.S. was 24.6 million,
of which more than 40 percent were Hispanic.
Hispanic-owned businesses in the U.S. increased 76 percent between 1987
and 1992, from 489,973 to 862,605. For the same period, all U.S. firms
increased by 26 percent, from 13.7 million to 17.3 million.
For the same five-year span, receipts for Hispanic-owned firms increased
134 percent from $32.8 billion to $76.8 billion while all U.S. firms
grew by 67 percent, from $2 trillion to 3.3 trillion.
Almost 70 percent of Hispanic owned firms were located in California,
Texas or Florida in 1992. But, New Mexico had the highest concentration
of Hispanic owned firms at 20 percent of all its businesses.
EDITOR'S NOTE: Rick Smith is the City Editor of the Pecos Enterprise whose column appears each Monday. He can be reached by e-mail at: rick@pecos.net.
My brother-in-law is Hiram Greg Luna and he served as an expert guide to
the wide open spaces of west Texas. We hope to visit again in October
and look forward to exploring the area further.If you see Greg say Hi!
for me.
KURT HAUEISEN
Pecos Enterprise
Mac McKinnon, Publisher
Division of Buckner News Alliance, Inc.
324 S. Cedar St., Pecos, TX 79772
Phone 915-445-5475, FAX 915-445-4321
e-mail: news@pecos.net
Associated Press text, photo, graphic, audio and/or video material shall not be published, broadcast, rewritten for broadcast or publication or redistributed directly or indirectly in any medium. Neither these AP Materials nor any portion thereof may be stored in a computer except for personal and non-commercial use. The AP will not be held liable for any delays, inaccuracies, errors or omissions therefrom or in the transmission or delivery of all or any part thereof or for any damages arising from any of the foregoing.
Copyright 1997 by Pecos Enterprise
We support Newspapers in Education