Talk of Ages

Age ~ and, more particularly, aging ~ seems to be the obsession du jour today (see post immediately below this one), but really, it's only because these articles and Census Bureau figures appeared recently. The fact that this country is getting grayer (OK, silver or platinum) pretty quickly is not news; we've been hearing this for years. But here's the interesting part: not all areas are doing so equally. The maps in this article show, for example, that the grayest counties seem to be in rural areas, mostly in the center of the country, while those with the fastest rise in older residents tend to be in the left half. One county in Nevada, population about 800, has seen the percentage of its residents over age 65 rise from 20 percent in 2010 to almost 30 percent in 2014. Other maps show where there are the fewest and the most working-age residents per capita and where more than 27.3 percent of the population is younger than 19: http://fivethirtyeight.com/datalab/some-parts-of-america-are-aging-much-faster-than-others/
   According to the latest report from the Census Bureau, millennials (those born between 1982 and 2000) now make up one-quarter of the population, and 44.2 percent of them belong to a minority race or ethnic group. Another interesting statistic is that, while most states are graying (led by Maine), North Dakota, Montana, Iowa, Hawaii, and Wyoming showed a decline in median age from July 1, 2013, to July 1, 2014. Utah is the state with the lowest median age (30.5): http://www.census.gov/newsroom/press-releases/2015/cb15-113.html