patterns of increasing diversity are less pronounced nationally, by 2060, 42.6 percent of
its projected total population of 420 million
(compared to 63.8 percent in 2010), will be
non-Hispanic White while 30.6 percent will
also be Hispanic, 13.2 percent non-Hispanic
Black, and 13.6 percent will be non-Hispanic Asians and Other.
Income Levels
Given these patterns of change, racial and
ethnic differences in socioeconomic characteristics are particularly important. Due to
a variety of historical, discriminatory and
other factors, there are substantial income
and poverty differentials between Texas racial/ethnic groups. At the state level median
household income for non-Hispanic White
households in 2010 was $59,517 but it was
$37,087 for Hispanics and $35,674 for
non-Hispanic Blacks; and, while 9.5 percent
of non-Hispanic White households lived in
poverty 26.8 percent of Hispanic and 24.7
percent of non-Hispanic Blacks lived in
poverty. These patterns are increasingly pervasive across regions and metropolitan and
nonmetropolitan areas in Texas and across
the nation.
Education & Socioeconomic Impact
Equally problematic is the fact that education differentials, which are among the best
predictors of long-term socioeconomic success, are substantial between non-Hispanic
White and other racial/ethnic groups. National data from the U.S. Department of La-
bor for 2013 show that the median weekly
earnings for a person with a grade school
level of education was $457, but $1,189 per
week for workers with a bachelor’s degree
or higher level of education. In 2010, only
11.6 percent of Hispanics and 19.7 percent
of non-Hispanic Blacks 25 years of age or
older in Texas had a bachelor’s or higher
level of education compared to 34.1 percent
of non-Hispanic Whites, while 40.4 percent
of Hispanics and 14 percent of non-Hispanic
Blacks had less than a high school education
compared to eight percent of non-Hispanic
Whites. This indicates that if we do not
change the socioeconomic characteristics
that currently characterize Texas (and the
nation’s) fast growing minority populations, we are likely to change not only our
demographic but our socioeconomic future
as well.
In fact, recent analyses completed by
us (and our coauthors) and reported in
Changing Texas: Implications of Addressing or Ignoring the Texas Challenge (Texas
A&M University Press, 2014), suggest just
how important closing the educational and
socioeconomic gaps between minority and
majority populations are for the socioeconomic future of the State. For example, such
analyses suggest that without closure, the
median household income of Texas would
decline from $66,333 per household in
2010 to $58,574 in 2050 (in 2010 constant
dollars) but if there was closure among
socioeconomic differentials for minorities
to projected non-Hispanic White levels, the
state level median household income for
2050 would be $131,916. Similarly, mean
consumer expenditure levels that were
$49,165 in 2010 could decrease to $45,081
by 2050 without closure but increase to
$89,332 with complete closure to non-Hispanic White levels. The percent of persons in
poverty was 17.8 percent in 2010 but could
be 20.9 percent in 2050 without closure but
11.9 percent with complete closure. Improved socioeconomic resources for minority populations are important both for these
populations and for the state as a whole.
In sum, it is clear that Texas’ population
is growing, and that such growth is primarily among minority population groups with
lower levels of educational attainment and
socioeconomic resources. Texas’ future
will be increasingly tied to its minority
populations, and if Texas cannot change
the current relationships between minority
status and socioeconomic resources in its
population through increased education and
other factors, Texas will be poorer and less
competitive in the future than it is today. If
this challenge is met and such differentials
are decreased, Texas’ population will be
wealthier and Texas will be more competitive in the future than it is today.
Steve H. Murdock is Director and Michael E. Cline
is Associate Director of the Hobby Center for the
Study of Texas at Rice University.
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