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Tract-level projections by age, sex, race and ethnicity for local policy makers

A line graph showing trends of population change in King county by race and how two projection methods compare to one another in their estimates of future populations. For White individuals in King County, the multi-stage smoothing method produces larger population projections than the HP method. However, the multi-stage smoothing method produces lower population projections for Asian and Hispanic individuals as well as those who identify as two or more races. There is no obvious difference in the projections produced by the two methods for King County’s Black, American Indian or Alaska Native, and Native Hawaiian or Other Pacific Islander populations. — Projection estimates by race and method. The more traditional HP method (dotted lines) produces projections which increase or decrease at a much quicker rate than the multi stage smoothing method (dashed lines). As such, the results tend to be more accurate as well.

Recent publications in population projection and forecasting research have called on scholars to broaden the methods available to scholars in order to make more accurate and detailed estimates of future populations. While a wealth of research has been devoted to population projections for large entities such as nations, less focus has been placed on making… Read More