Demography, the study of human populations, is an important subfield within Sociology. This assignment requires you to write a demographic analysis of your hometown – to look up, present, and analyze data about the population using the U.S. Census Bureau’s web site. You will compare your home town with its state and with the United States. 1) List your hometown’s name (or census tract #) and its total population (Ex: ‘Anytown, NY: population 10,384’) 2) Find your data: Choose three demographic variables based on what you think will give insight into your community. *** Think carefully about which variables to choose, since you will write a paper about this data. You may choose: o Income distribution and/or median income o Percentage below poverty o Housing (e.g., percentage in owner occupied housing, median value of homes) o Education (e.g., educational attainment) o Employment (or unemployment) rate and/or Labor Force participation rate (make sure you understand the difference!) o Type of employment o Age distribution o Race/Ethnicity o Percentage foreign-born o Languages Spoken o Ancestry o Other variable of interest (But do not use the variable ‘sex’ ) To understand the data on your hometown, you will need to compare it with other regions. In addition to your own hometown, you will consider data for the entire United States and for your State, or another geographic area of your choice.
