Every mid-year, the U.S. Census Bureau updates its estimate of the country's population, and includes a breakdown by the four major regions.
Here are those figures as of July 1, 2008:
U.S. Total 304,059,724
Northeast 54,924,779
Midwest 66,561,448
South 111,718,549
West 70,854,948
What is most striking about these totals, to me, is that ~60% of the people now reside in the Sunbelt. This shapes not only our politics, but our economy, which is filled with distortions -- housing bubbles, disparities in the price of gasoline as well as retail goods, uneven Internet access, including broadband & wireless, differing tax policies and civil rights laws, varying levels of social welfare services, and huge differences in good old pure income.
Can anyone manage such a large, sprawling country filled with such persistent internal contradictions? That task falls to our new, young, dynamic President.
May you do well, Mr. Obama. Happy New Year!
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