1.3 The Urgent Need Today: Changing US Demographics

There was a time not that long ago when growing up in the United States meant it was possible to mingle only with people of the same ethnic background. It is still true that people often socialize in cultural bubbles, experiencing life through the lens of those with whom they share common socioeconomic backgrounds. But the soaring pace of migration over the last 20 years has made it nearly impossible to ignore the de-homogenization of American life and thus the workplace.

With this in mind, we will look at some of the key demographic trends in the US requiring a greater need for intercultural competency. There are 11 dramatic shifts that require aspiring leaders in business, government, health care, and education to communicate across cultures. And by cultures, we are referring to specific groups that identify or are perceived as having a unique set of needs, interests, and environments.

1. Immigration: As of 2023, immigrants accounted for 14.3 percent of the US population, or 47.8 million people. This represents about a threefold increase from 4.7 percent in 1970. About half of these immigrants above the age of five consider themselves proficient in English.1 By 2028, the proportion of immigrants living in the United States is expected to reach 14.9 percent, the highest level since 1850. The foreign-born population is expected to grow to 69 million by 2060.2 Prior to the 1970s, most immigrants to the United States were from Europe. But today, and for the future, Asia and Latin America are expected to be the top sources of new foreign residents.3

2. Hispanic: There was a 133.4 percent growth of US residents, age five and older, who spoke Spanish at home between 1990 and 2016, according to the US Census Bureau. Between 1965 and 2015, about half of all US immigrants, or 30 million people, came from Latin America.4 The Census Bureau predicts that by 2060, 28.6 percent of the US population will be Hispanic, up from 17.8 percent in 2016.

3. Asian: The Pew Research Center predicts that Asians will be the largest immigrant group in the US by 2055, surpassing Hispanic immigrants.5 China, India, and the Philippines are currently the leading source countries for Asian immigration into the United States.

4. The Wealth Gap: Pew reports that the wealth gap between America’s richest and poorest families more than doubled from 1989 to 2016.6 The gap slightly decreased as lower-wealth groups had larger percentage gains in wealth from 2016–2022, with the biggest decrease during the COVID-19 pandemic.7 Despite overall gains in wealth, there is still a wide gap in income disparity between racial and ethnic groups. The United States has one of the highest levels of income inequality in the world, a situation that analysts say can lead to social unrest.8

5. Nonreligious Growth: About 64 percent of Americans identify as Christian, according to Pew. That number has been decreasing steadily for seven decades. American religious diversity is expected to increase as steady growth is forecast for the small Muslim and Hindu populations, but the largest growth is predicted to be among those with no religious affiliation.9 Pew also found that 8 in 10 Americans think that religion overall is losing influence in public life. Many express unease about the trajectory of the interaction between religion, politics, and society but disagree about what those interactions should look like.10

6. Mixing It Up: In 1967, roughly 3 percent of Americans were married to someone of a different race or ethnicity than themselves. It was this year that the U.S. Supreme Court, in Loving v. Virginia, ruled that interracial marriage was legal throughout the country. Fifty years later, in 2017, one in six married couples—or 17 percent—were in interracial marriages, according to Pew.11 For the purposes of our discourse here, we will use the US Census Bureau racial categorizations: White, Black, Hispanic, Native American/Pacific Islander, and Asian. (These are superimposed categories with no biological or anthropological basis).12 Our increased connections with people of mixed races and mixed ethnicities will require a new way of addressing, respecting, and understanding identities—real and applied.

7. LGBTQ: The percentage of American adults identifying as lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, or queer (LGBTQ) increased to 7.6 percent in 2022. This is up from 4.1 percent in 2016 and 3.5 percent in 2012 when the Gallup polling agency first began tracking this category.13 Gallup attributes the increase, expected to continue, to millennials and Gen Z being more open about their gender and sexual identity than previous generations. However, despite the growing support for gay marriage, Gallup reported in 2024 that 29 percent of those polled said same-sex marriages should not be reconized as legally valid.14 Since many firms have LGBTQ rights as part of their diversity programs, discomfort with these identities could disrupt work communication without mitigating measures.

8. Diversity at Work: The US labor force is becoming more diverse in terms of race and ethnicity. The Bureau of Labor Statistics reports that between 1979 and 2022, the non-White proportion of all U.S. workers grew from 12 percent to 23 percent. The group with the largest increase has been Hispanic or Latino workers (who may identify as any race), growing from 5 percent in 1979 to 19 percent in 2022.15 The spread of different groups across the company hierarchy, as well as communication to and between these groups, will impact employee attitudes and satisfaction as countless surveys already reveal.

9. Disability: As of 2023, the employment rate for adults with disabilities was 22.5 percent, compared to 65.8 percent for adults without disabilities.16 This number is expected to rise dramatically due to four factors: the growth of remote work, government pressure on greater accessibility, major advancements in technical support for those with disabilities, and expansive efforts by advocacy groups.

10. Single Parents: A 2019 Pew study of 130 countries and territories revealed that the US had the world’s highest rate of children living in single-parent households, about 23 percent.17 This trend is predicted to increase by 12 percent by 2030, based on the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) data.18

11. The Graying of America: This is the actual name of a US Census Bureau report in 2018, in which the bureau announced that by 2035, seniors will outnumber children for the first time in US history. The report states: “With this swelling number of older adults, the country could see greater demands for healthcare, in-home caregiving and assisted living facilities. It could also affect Social Security.”19 This could also mean an increasing number of workers will be taking care of their children and their parents simultaneously.

The 11 trends you have just reviewed have a common narrative thread: the need to communicate across cultures in every area of our lives. Recognizing how these trends affect our perceptions of cultural status in any environment we enter—work, school, health facilities, sports, romance, travel—is going to be crucial for our efforts to foster positive communication.

So what types of intercultural issues might we consider when looking at these trends?

As students, you are probably in the best position to consider the following: Between 1996 and 2020, share of undergraduates who identified as a race or ethnicity other than White grew from 32.2 percent to 49.9 percent, and the share of graduate students who identified as a race or ethnicity other than White grew from 31.8 percent to 50.7 percent.20 But in 2020, people of color held only 30.6 percent of full-time faculty positions. That comparative distribution has led to calls for greater diversity in the academic sphere by students and those who teach them.

Sometimes communication is a call for justice, retribution, and a new way of thinking about the past. Consider the public, political, and academic discourse—sometimes divisive but enlightening—over plans for some schools to use the New York Times Magazine’s 1619 Project as a main teaching text in high schools.21 The project proposes that those seeking to study US history should begin with the arrival of slaves in North America as their focal point, instead of the Declaration of Independence.

Then there is the refrain among research organizations that by a certain year, say, 2045, the US will be a majority non-White country.22 If we are all Americans, why is that so important? Are there such vast value and communication differences between people of color and Whites that we need a set of guidelines for interaction and equity? Or is it related to the fact that Hispanic and Black minorities have had to contend for decades with lower incomes, lower rates of higher education, and higher levels of discrimination? This is a politicized polemic that we cannot answer here, but these fractious issues represent why intercultural communication is such an urgent matter.

It’s possible that if more Americans studied intercultural communication, issues ranging from the disproportionate incarceration of people of color to the sharp rise in hate crimes against Muslim Americans after 9/11 would have been reduced, prevented, or at least more widely analyzed across every level of society.

With the increasing diversity in the United States, there is also a growth in the willingness of minority groups to proudly show their differences and also ask for the recognition of injustices. This movement toward greater identity consciousness—critics call it identity politics—has created a host of intercultural communication changes in the past five years alone. There are movements fueled by workplace initiatives, social media, and celebrities championing the rights of groups, holidays, and historical events. From Black Lives Matter to Pride to Latina Equal Pay Day, these movements, celebrations, and commemorations have created new exchanges, and sometimes conflicts, within American society.

It’s important to remember that the change in US demographics comes at a time when there are tremendous global demographic upheavals: The war in Syria was at its apex in 2015, followed by a genocide of the Rohingya ethnic minority in Myanmar, the U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan in 2021, the Russian invasion of Ukraine in 2022, the Israel–Hamas war beginning in 2023, and many other conflicts and catastrophes around the globe, causing an unprecedented 117.3 million displaced people on our planet as of 2023.23 The conflicts and natural disasters that led to the mass displacement of one percent of the world’s population also impact our perception of and communication with other cultures. As an example, Muslim refugees fleeing armed conflict today are treated very differently than refugees who fled former Soviet Union and Communist Eastern Europe during the Cold War and were embraced by the West.

Economic trends also play a key role in our attitude toward immigrants and diversity in general. During the Great Depression, the US government required millions of Mexicans and Mexican Americans—US citizens—to return to Mexico. There might be many shifts in attitudes and demographics in the next decades that no analyst can predict as a result of economic turmoil.

In a more positive vein, many businesses today view diversity as a benefit in terms of creativity, profit, and productivity.24 Changing US demographics prove that improving intercultural communication is no longer a token favor to minorities but a matter of competitive survival for any organization. We will see this in our future topics about diversity in the business world.