Regional Overview

Race and Ethnicity

Buffalo Niagara Racial-Ethnic Composition
Western New York, 2000

Click on graphic to enlarge

Recent data for the Buffalo Niagara region (1996 for Southern Ontario CMAs and 2000 for Western New York) reveal a region with proportionally low racial diversity. About 90% of the region's residents (85% in Western New York and 94% in Southern Ontario) are white. The racial composition of the region's racial minorities varies somewhat across the international border. Black residents comprise 9% of Western New York's residents, compared to 1% in Southern Ontario. Asian/Pacific Islanders are more common in Southern Ontario than in Western New York, 4% as opposed to 1%, while North American Indians form around 1% of the population in each part of the region (see charts, Buffalo Niagara Racial and Ethnic Composition, Western New York, 2000 and So. Ontario, 1996).

Buffalo Niagara Racial-Ethnic Composition
So. Ontario, 1996 Click on graphic to enlarge Persons of Hispanic origin, a group considered an ethnicity not a race (Hispanic people may be of any race), remain a relatively small but growing segment of the Buffalo Niagara region. As of 2000, the region had over 54,000 persons of Hispanic origin, comprising 3% of the Western New York population and less than 1% of the population of Southern Ontario. The Hispanic share of the Western New York population has more than doubled since 1980.

The geographic distribution of persons of racial minorities or Hispanic origin is uneven across the region (see map, Percent Minority Population, 2000). With a minority population of 17.8%—primarily residing in the City of Buffalo—Erie County has the region's largest share of minority residents. Orleans County (which houses a correctional facility with a disproportionately large minority population), Niagara and Wyoming Counties, and the City of Hamilton follow with a minority population share of 7.9% to 10.93%. The Regional Municipality of Niagara, Genesee County, and the three Southern Tier Counties—Allegany, Cattaraugus, and Chautauqua—each have a minority population less or equal to than 6%.

Percent Minority Population, 2000 Click on graphic to enlarge Data from U.S. Census 2000 show that the 10,908 persons living on one of the region's five American Indian Reservations are generally younger, poorer, less educated, and more likely to be unemployed than is the overall Western New York population (see table, Summary of WNY American Indian Census Data, 2000).

American Indian reservation populations in Western New York have a higher share of persons under age 14 compared to the region overall, 25% compared to 20%, respectively. A somewhat lower share of reservation households, 40% compared to 49% for Western New York, is married couple families. In addition, reservations have proportionally more female-headed family households with no husband present, 19%, relative to 13% in the region overall.

Socioeconomically, only 12% of reservation populations have a bachelor's degree or higher, compared to 21% for Western New York overall. Lower educational attainment may be a factor in the lower median household income of $26,300 as of 1999 compared to $37,700 in the region overall. This difference reflects also in unemployment levels: while only 4% of Western New Yorkers overall were unemployed at the time of the U.S. Census 2000, an additional 50% more, or 6%, of reservation persons over 16 were unemployed. These trends factor in significantly higher poverty rates, with persons on reservations far more likely to fall under the poverty line, with 22% of reservation individuals compared to 12% of Western New Yorkers overall in this category.

Summary of WNY
American Indian Census Data, 2000 Click on graphic to enlarge Notwithstanding these important differences, in several instances reservation populations are more similar to the overall Western New York population than is commonly thought. Approximately two-thirds of households on both reservations and in Western New York, 66% and 65%, respectively, are family households; that is, units composed of persons related by birth, marriage or adoption. A similar percentage, 68% compared to 72%, of reservation and regional housing units are owner-occupied. At 14%, the percentage of persons over age 65 years on Indian reservations is identical to that in Western New York overall. In both areas, just over 60% of the population 16 years and over is in the labor force.