The fastest growing segment of the population, both globally and in the United States, is older adults. People aged 80 and older are the single fastest growing age group worldwide, with their numbers expected to triple between 2020 and 2050, reaching 426 million. In the U.S. specifically, the fastest growing racial or ethnic groups by percentage are the multiracial population (growing at 2.4% per year) and the Asian population (2.3% per year), though in raw numbers, the Hispanic population drives the majority of overall U.S. growth.
Both of these trends are reshaping economies, healthcare systems, and social structures in ways that will affect nearly everyone alive today.
Older Adults Are Growing Faster Than Any Other Age Group
The global population of people over 60 already outnumbers children younger than 5. By 2050, the share of the world’s population over 60 will nearly double, rising from 12% to 22%, for a total of 2.1 billion people. But the real acceleration is happening at the very top of the age range. People aged 80 and older made up just 0.6% of the world’s population in 1950. That climbed to 1.6% by 2010 and is projected to hit 4.1% by 2050.
Centenarians represent an even more dramatic trend. The world had nearly half a million people aged 100 or older in 2015, already four times the number in 1990. Pew Research Center projects that figure will grow eightfold to 3.7 million by 2050.
Why the Oldest Population Is Growing So Fast
Three forces are converging. The most powerful is falling fertility rates: when fewer children are born, the average age of the population rises over time. This is the single largest driver of population aging worldwide. Second, people are living longer. Declining tobacco use and improvements in medical technology have extended life expectancy, particularly past age 65. Across wealthy nations, a person who reaches 65 can now expect to live an additional 19.5 years on average, with women gaining about 3.3 more years than men. In Spain, a 65-year-old woman can expect to live to nearly 89.
The third factor is generational size. The enormous baby boom cohorts born in the mid-20th century are now entering their 70s and 80s, creating a bulge in the older population that will persist for decades.
Racial and Ethnic Growth in the United States
When people ask about the “fastest growing segment,” they sometimes mean race or ethnicity rather than age. In the U.S., the answer depends on whether you measure by percentage growth or total numbers added. Between 2022 and 2023, the multiracial population grew at 2.4%, the fastest rate of any group, crossing 8 million people. The Asian population grew at 2.3%, adding about 466,000 people to reach 20.7 million.
In absolute numbers, though, the Hispanic population dominates U.S. growth. Hispanics accounted for nearly 71% of total U.S. population growth between 2022 and 2023, adding 1.16 million people for a total of just over 65 million. That 1.8% annual growth rate stands in sharp contrast to the 0.2% increase in the non-Hispanic population. The non-Hispanic White population actually declined, the only major demographic group to shrink.
The Black population grew at 0.6%, while the American Indian and Alaska Native population grew at 0.3%.
What an Aging Population Means for the Economy
As the older population expands, the ratio of working-age adults to retirees shrinks. In the U.S., there were roughly three and a half working-age adults for every retirement-age person in 2020. By 2060, that ratio is projected to fall to just two and a half to one. Fewer workers supporting more retirees puts direct pressure on pension systems, tax revenue, and economic output.
Research published in Heliyon found that a 1% increase in the old-age dependency ratio leads to a 1.6% increase in government spending on social protection. Health spending, environmental costs, and social services all climb in tandem. Per capita health costs are projected to outpace GDP growth in the coming decades, meaning healthcare will consume a growing share of national budgets. This pattern holds clearly in higher-income countries, though not yet in middle- and low-income nations where social safety nets are less developed.
A Historic Milestone in the U.S.
The U.S. Census Bureau has projected that older adults will outnumber children for the first time in American history within the coming decades. This is not a temporary blip. It reflects a permanent structural shift in how populations are distributed by age. Countries across Europe and East Asia are already further along this curve, with some seeing more deaths than births each year.
The practical effects touch everything from housing demand (more single-person households, more need for accessible design) to labor markets (workforce shortages in physical industries, longer careers in knowledge work) to family structures (more adults simultaneously caring for aging parents and their own children). The speed of this shift is what makes it so consequential. Societies that took centuries to age gradually in the past are now compressing that transition into a few decades.