U.s. Census | featured news

After more than a century, the Census Bureau is dropping its use of the word "Negro" to describe black Americans in surveys. Instead of the term that came into use during the Jim Crow era of racial segregation, census forms will use the more modern labels "black" or "African-American".

The U.S. population is projected to increase to 315,091,138 on Jan. 1, the U.S. Census Bureau said on Thursday. That represents a one-year increase of 2,272,462, or 0.73%, and a jump of 6.34 million, or just over 2%, since the last census was taken in 2010.

For the first time, the Census Bureau is giving U.S. households a chance to respond to government surveys over the Internet, part of a bid to save costs and boost sagging response rates.

When the 1940 census records are released Monday, Verla Morris can consider herself a part of living history....