America's Largest Ethnic Groups

Throughout the year of 2014, The American Mosaic will present rankings of the largest ethnic groups in each state, plus the District of Columbia.

Each week a new state will be highlighted. The rankings are based on the United States Census Bureau's 2010 Decennial Census and the 2010 American Community Survey.

Collecting ethnic and nationality data from the Census is not so straightforward. Not every ethnicity is surveyed for every state: states with smaller populations receive an abbreviated survey. Also, different surveys elaborate on ancestry or ethnicity depending on the race. The Census Bureau only surveys white and black ethnicities under "Ancestry" in the American Community Survey. Meanwhile Asian, Hispanic and Native American nationalities are collected separately in the decennial Census. Lastly, African-American is not a separate ethnicity for the Census, rather it is collected under race, combined with other Black ethnic groups. To determine the African-American population, West Indian & African nationalities as well as Hispanic Blacks were subtracted from the total Black population, with the balance assumed to be African- Americans.

Starting this off is a look at the largest ethnic groups nationally. While there has been increased racial diversity due to a boom in immigration from Latin America and Asia, European ethnicities still dominate, with German being the country's largest ethnic group:

Rank	Ethnicity	2010 United States Population	As a Percent of Total United States Population
	Total Population	309,349,689	100.0%
1	German	47,901,779	15.5%
2	Irish	34,669,616	11.2%
3	Mexican	32,929,683	10.6%
4	African-American*	32,484,003	10.5%
5	English	25,926,451	8.4%
6	American	19,975,875	6.5%
7	Italian	17,235,941	5.6%
8	Polish	9,569,207	3.1%
9	French, except Basque	8,761,496	2.8%
10	Scottish	5,460,679	1.8%
11	Puerto Rican	4,691,890	1.5%
12	Dutch	4,645,131	1.5%
13	Norwegian	4,470,081	1.4%
14	Swedish	4,088,555	1.3%
15	European	3,616,843	1.2%
16	Chinese, except Taiwanese	3,291,388	1.1%
17	Scotch-Irish	3,257,161	1.1%
18	Russian	2,971,599	1.0%
19	Asian Indian	2,765,155	0.9%
20	Filipino	2,512,686	0.8%
21	French Canadian	2,042,808	0.7%
22	Cuban	1,873,585	0.6%
23	Salvadoran	1,829,798	0.6%
24	Welsh	1,793,356	0.6%
25	African	1,676,413	0.5%
26	Vietnamese	1,625,365	0.5%
27	Czech	1,525,187	0.5%
28	Dominican (Dominican Republic)	1,508,871	0.5%
29	Hungarian	1,501,736	0.5%
30	Korean	1,456,076	0.5%
31	Portuguese	1,405,909	0.5%
32	Danish	1,375,506	0.4%
33	Greek	1,315,775	0.4%
34	British	1,181,340	0.4%
35	Guatemalan	1,156,861	0.4%
36	Jamaican	965,355	0.3%
37	Swiss	961,380	0.3%
38	Colombian	961,223	0.3%
39	Ukrainian	939,746	0.3%
40	Haitian	881,488	0.3%
41	Japanese	774,600	0.3%
42	Slovak	762,030	0.2%
43	Honduran	730,227	0.2%
44	Austrian	722,282	0.2%
45	Canadian	717,390	0.2%
46	Spaniard	694,494	0.2%
47	Lithuanian	660,071	0.2%
48	Ecuadorian	650,348	0.2%
49	Finnish	647,697	0.2%
50	Peruvian	598,671	0.2%

Source: US Census Bureau, 2010 American Community Survey

1 year estimates, tables: B02001, B02005, B02006, B02007, B03001, B03002, B04006, C02005, C02006, C02007, C03001, C04006

* African-American is derived as respondents selecting Black as racial group after removing African, West Indian, and Hispanic ethnicities.