| 摘要 | Key Points
The millennial generation (born between 1981 and 1996) is the most racially and ethnically diverse in US history and will soon comprise the largest segment of the US population.
Religious disaffiliation and unaffiliation are occurring across adult generations, especially among millennials and even among those who were raised in a religion. Millennials tend to place more value on individual expression than on belonging to an institution or organization.
Millennials are the most educated of any US adult generation, and they are highly in debt. Yet, more millennial households live in poverty than previous generations. This is because millennial households are more likely to be headed by minorities, underscoring systemic inequality issues.
The majority of millennials identify with the Democratic Party and its positions, but they are deeply divided about abortion and restrictive immigration policies. How millennials will express these views in the next decade will determine the policy direction of the country.
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Executive Summary
Millennials, the generation born between 1981 and 1996, will soon comprise the largest segment of the US adult population. They are the most ethnically and racially diverse generation in US history. They have the highest rate of postsecondary educational attainment of any adult generation in the US. Slightly over half—56 percent—of all millennials identify as Christians, among whom 21 percent identify with Evangelical Protestantism. Many millennials view themselves as religious or spiritual without adhering to a doctrinal orthodoxy.
Issues on which there is majority consensus among millennials (racism, homosexuality, abortion, and stronger environmental regulations) and a growing majority (same-sex marriage, legalization of marijuana, and government-funded social programs) show that they are a more liberal generation. How their views will translate into political action is yet to be seen.
Introduction
Millennials, the generation born between 1981 and 1996, will soon comprise the largest segment of the US adult population. Currently, millennials—compared to Generation X (Gen X) and baby boomers—are the largest share of the American workforce and the US electorate.1 A quick demographic snapshot tells us millennials are the most ethnically and racially diverse generation in US history. They are less white (56 percent) than Gen X (61 percent) and the baby boomer generation (72 percent).2 An estimated 43 percent of millennial adults are nonwhite, the highest share of any generation.3 Millennials are the first generation in the US to grow up with a prevalence of individuals of other ethnic, racial, cultural, and religious backgrounds. Among millennials, 21 percent are Hispanic, 13 percent African American, 7 percent Asian, and 3 percent identifying as two or more races.4 Cross-cutting social interactions among the various ethnic and racial groups is altering stereotypical perceptions, creating new affiliations through interracial and interethnic friendship and marriage, and increasing support for systemic policy change.
Several pivotal pieces of legislation that were enacted before millennials were born changed America’s demographic composition.5 Central among these was the Immigration and Naturalization Act, or the Hart-Celler Act (1965), which eliminated national origin quotas. As a result, the geographic region of origin for immigrants shifted from Europe to Latin America and Asia.
In 2016, Hispanics comprised 18 percent of the nation’s population and were the second-largest ethnic/racial group behind whites.6 Between 1980 and 2000, immigration was the principal means of Hispanic population growth—from 4.2 million persons to 14.1 million—making it the largest minority of millennials.7 Since 2000, the growth in the Hispanic population is mostly due to births—9.6 million Hispanic births—representing a record high of 23 percent of total births in the US between 2000 and 2010.8 Immigrant Hispanic women account for the high fertility rate. The Hispanic birth rate, at 2.4 percent, is outpacing all ethnic and racial groups, including African Americans.9
Other factors contributing to the increase in the Hispanic presence in the United States are the low birth and high mortality rates among whites, causing a below-replacement fertility rate for whites, and the slightly more equal ratio of birth and mortality rates for African Americans. The rising shares of Hispanic and Asian women of prime childbearing age, particularly Hispanic, are significantly contributing to the natural increase of racial and ethnic minority children who will be the majority by 2020.10 The Asian birth rate, at 1.8 percent, is comparable to that of whites.
Although Asians make up the smallest minority of the millennial generation, they are projected to become 9.5 percent of the US population by 2060. For the past few years, they have been the fastest-growing immigrant group to the United States (see Figure 1).11 As the Asian population increases, the white majority will decrease, becoming a minority. The United States is projected to cross over to a majority-minority population—less than 50 percent white—in 2044. In that year, the oldest and youngest millennials, respectively, will be 63 years and 48 years of age.
The legalization of interracial marriage by the US Supreme Court in 1967 led to a steady increase in mixed marriages, from 1 percent in 1970 to 10 percent in 2015.12 This trend is reflected in the rise of multiethnic or multiracial infants, from 1 percent in 1970 to 14 percent in 2015.13
With interracial marriages, the size of the racial/ ethnic group matters.14 The largest racial/ethnic group in the United States—native-born whites—overwhelmingly marries each other (over 98 percent). The smallest racial/ethnic group—native-born Asians—exhibits a high rate of mixed marriage (men, 35.6 percent; women, 49.2 percent). Asians intermarry almost exclusively with whites, and the white man–Asian woman union is the most common intermarriage in the United States today.15 The least likely intermarriage is between an Asian man and an African American woman.16
In 2014–15, 39 percent of native-born Hispanic newlyweds and almost half (46 percent) of native-born Asian newlyweds had a spouse of a different race or ethnicity. Second-generation and native-born Asians and Hispanics have much higher rates of marriage to white natives than do their African American counterparts.17 These findings indicate that the immigrant status and race/ethnicity of Asians and Hispanics pose much weaker barriers to outmarriage to white natives than they do among African Americans.
Native-born African American men (73.7 percent) are far more likely than native-born Hispanic men (46.6 percent) to marry within their racial/ethnic group. Native-born African American men are far less likely than their Hispanic counterparts to marry white women (14.7 percent versus 33.6 percent) but more likely to marry other minorities (7.4 percent versus 5 percent). Native-born African American women, when compared to their native-born male counterparts, are more likely to marry foreign-born African Americans (4.3 versus. 2.3 percent). And an even smaller percentage of native-born African American women than their counterparts marry whites (6.0 percent and 14.7 percent, respectively).18
Since the 1960s, intermarriage is far more common among those who have a college education or above than those who have a high school education or less. Economist Roland Fryer found that, adjusting for the relative number of individuals in each educational category, patterns of racial intermarriage by level of education are strikingly similar across all racial groups.19 Educational attainment provides an opportunity for minorities to marry outside their ethnic/racial group, and immigrants with higher levels of education are more likely than immigrants with little education to assimilate by marrying native-born co-ethnics or whites.20
Although a small percentage of millennials are multiethnic or multiracial, the high rate of acceptance of mixed marriages among this generation means the demographic composition of the United States will shift toward multiple minorities with no single dominant group, as historically has been the case. A US Census Bureau study projects that the category of “two or more races” will be the fastest-growing segment of the population between 2014 and 2060, increasing from 2.5 percent to 6.2 percent.21
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