Demographics of Washington, D.C.

The demographics of Washington, D.C., also known as the District of Columbia, reflect an ethnically diverse, cosmopolitan, mid-size capital city. In 2015, the District had a population of 672,228 people with a resident density of 11,000 people per square mile. The city has seen a net population gain of more than 70,000 people since the 2010 Census and more than 100,000 people since the 2000 Census. Washington, D.C., is unique among major U.S. cities in that its founding was not organic, but rather established as a result of a political compromise. The District had relatively few residents during much of its early history up until the Civil War. The presence of the U.S. federal government in Washington has been instrumental in the city's later growth and development. Its role as the capital leads people to forget that Washington has a native resident population.

In 2011 Washington's black population slipped below 50 percent for the first time in over 50 years. The city was a majority-black city from the late 1950s through 2011. Washington has had a significant African-American population since the city's creation; several D.C. neighborhoods are well-noted for their contributions to black history and culture. Like numerous other border and northern cities in the first half of the 20th century, Washington received many black migrants from the South in the Great Migration, who moved North for better education and job opportunities, as well as to escape legal segregation and lynchings. Government growth related to World War II provided economic opportunities for African Americans, too.

In the postwar era, the percentage of African Americans in the city steadily increased as its total population declined as a result of suburbanization supported by federal highway construction, and white flight. The black population included a strong middle and upper class.

Since the 2000 U.S. Census, the city has added more than 100,000 residents and reversed a significant amount of the population losses seen in previous decades. The District has experienced an increase in the proportion of white, Asian, and Hispanic residents, and a decline in the city's black population. Some of the latter have moved to the suburbs; others have moved to new opportunities in the South in a New Great Migration.

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