‘U.S. Latinos at crossroad’

I had this story on page 6 today:

The United States could be one-quarter Hispanic by 2030 – but America’s hottest immigrant group faces unique health and educational challenges, two new reports say.

One report, by the National Academy of Sciences, called for new educational programs to allow Hispanics to take full advantage of the American dream.

“We are in the midst of a Hispanic moment – it is dynamic, and yet its course is not entirely clear,” said Marta Tienda, a Princeton University professor who chaired the panel….

How Hispanics are treated in places like Atlanta, Reno and Raleigh, N.C., will determine whether “Hispanicity” becomes a symbolic identity such as Greek and Irish, or an enduring sign of membership in a disadvantaged group, Tienda said.

The story was a combination of this report by the National Academy of Sciences and this study (PDF file) by the CDC’s National Center for Health Statistics. The CDC study notes, oddly, that Hispanics tend to get fatter and are more likely develop hypertension the longer they’re in the U.S. (This is true of no other immigrant group, apparently — black immigrants tend to get healthier, the longer they’re here).

I concluded the story with this ‘graph:

Tienda said the “Hispanic moment” would eventually pass, as declining Latin American birth rates slow immigration. Already, more Hispanics are born in the U.S. than immigrate here, and the third generation will likely speak mostly English, she said. Spanish-language neighborhoods are a “transitory phenomenon.”

I thought that was an interesting point. I remember that when I lived in Manchester, N.H., I learned that the entire west side of the city (across the Merrimack River) had once been almost entirely French-speaking. All these French-Canadians had come down to work in the mills, transforming the city.