Nearly ten years ago, after the 2010 U.S. Census results came out, we did a deep-dive into the shifts in ethnic make-up of America's cities.
At this moment, the full 2020 Census figures are being crunched. As soon as they are out, we shall update this piece to reflect the new face of these metropolises, some of which we suspect will have changed radically in the last ten years.
As we wait for the new numbers, let's revisit the data up until 2010... and predict what changes are about to be revealed.
Why did we write this piece? Though black criminality in
North America has always surpassed that of Euros, separating oneself from Afro neighbors was not difficult for the first 350
years of British North America / the United States. Even in the North,
segregation in housing was permitted de facto where it was not de
jure.
The 'Great Migration,' waves of Afros moving from
the South to the North, began in earnest in 1910, with its second wave after
WWII (1945).
However, the flight of
Euro-Americans out of the cities did not truly begin until Blacks were free to live where they pleased-- the 1960s. Since
then, a sort of merry-go-round has ensued: Whites, suffering under Afro
dysfunction, flee to suburbs, only to be pursued by the Talented Tenth fleeing same. The
latter are followed, as night follows day, by the Untalented Nine-Tenths,
who promptly re-create the urban hellscapes they left behind. Euro-Americans
are forced to pack up, and the musical chairs begin again. Section 8 vouchers have revved this carousel up
to warp speed.
We can in fact watch the flight unfold before our eyes via U.S. Census numbers.
We give the figures from 1960, just before Segregation ended.
We then fast-forward twenty years to 1980 to see what the first wave of 'White Flight' has wrought.
Finally, we give the most recent figures (2010), which contain some surprises, especially re: Hispanics, who did not even exist as a census category two generations ago.
For selected cities, we have also given the figures from 1910, before the Great Migration got underway. Asians have been included where their historic presence has been strongest.
So: Who's fleeing whom?
We start with the Midwest,
industrial center and destination of choice for the Great Migrators:
