Population growth has continued over the past decade, especially in the southern and western United States. At the end of the last decade, the population of Utah increased by 18.4 percent compared to 2010. The population shrank, especially in the Northeast and Midwest. Even West Virginia in the east had a population of 3.2 percent smaller, the largest decline.
The census is of great political importance: 435 seats in the US House of Representatives are distributed every ten years according to the population in each of the 50 states. Countries with high population growth have a greater chance of securing one or more seats, to the detriment of countries with low growth or even population decline.
New York, Illinois, Michigan, Ohio, West Virginia and Pennsylvania will lose seats this year. The nation’s largest state, California, is also losing a seat for the first time in its history. Florida, North Carolina, Colorado, Montana and Oregon won one, and the second largest state in Texas won two others.
In some states, the results were particularly narrow: New York, the fourth-largest state in the United States, would have held its seat if it had not had more than 89 residents in the census in April of last year, according to the US Census Bureau. Minnesota should have given up a seat instead.
Republicans
According to political scientists, the results of the new census could make it easier for Republicans to regain control of the House of Representatives next year. Republican states like Texas and Florida won seats there, at the expense of Democratic-minded states.
The results also show that population growth in the United States has slowed significantly in the past decade. The population of the United States was 331.5 million as of April 1, 2020. This is 7.4 percent more than in 2010, but in the past decade the American population has increased by 9.7 percent. It is also the second weakest population growth since the United States began conducting systematic censuses in 1790. Only between 1930 and 1940, during the Great Depression, was the growth 7.3 percent weaker than in the previous decade.
At the start of the last decade, the United States was still grappling with the fallout from the financial crisis. The birth rate has decreased and many Mexicans decide to return home. President Donald Trump took office again in 2017. He slowed legal immigration and did everything in his power to combat illegal immigration.
