This report presents a statistical portrait of the demographic, social, and economic characteristics of American children and youth. Data are compiled from U.S. Government sources—from surveys, decennial censuses, and vital statistics. The majority of the data have been published previously in Bureau of the Census or other governmental reports but are being brought together here as a matter of convenience to the interested user. Some data, however, are being published here for the first time.

This report focuses on the characteristics of persons under 25 years of age. In general, “children" are defined as persons under 14 years old, and “youth" is considered to encompass the age range 14 to 24 years old. Exceptions to this arbitrary age division necessarily occur in this report because of restrictions in data collection by age which are inherent to certain subject matter areas.

The analyses trace changes among children and youth in the areas of population growth and distribution, migration, education, marital status and living arrangements, fertility, mortality and health, labor force participation, occupation, income and poverty status, voting, and crime and victimization.

This report provides an historical perspective of the current socioeconomic situation in which American children and youth develop. Selected topics are examined in time series beginning in 1950; trend data for other subjects are presented for a more recent time span.

The statistics in this report pertaining to youth update those presented in “Characteristics of American Youth: 1974,” Current Population Reports, Series P-23, No. 51. No comparable report relating to children has been issued previously by the Bureau of the Census.