Posted at 11:20 a.m., Monday, August 6, 2001

Hawai'i makes its mark in Census, however small

Advertiser news services

Finally, some fun stuff is starting to filter out from the Census Bureau. The latest data dump has some of the minutiae that marketers and trivia junkies have been waiting for. For instance:

• Hawai'i has the most one-room housing units per capita; Utah has the most homes with at least nine rooms.

• Hawai'i and California lead the nation in share of residents who spend 40 percent or more of their income on housing.

• Hawai'i is ranked third among states with the lowest percentage of drivers who drive alone.

• Idaho has more people of Bulgarian ancestry than any other state. It also has the highest rate of marriage under age 20.

• Roughly 2.5 million Americans commute more than 90 minutes to work. That's three hours round-trip, five days a week.

These factoids and more can be found from the Census 2000 Supplementary Survey released today. The survey of 700,000 households in 1,203 counties was conducted at the same time as the 2000 Census last year.

The survey also provides a somber snapshot of life in America. Nationwide, one in six children lives in poverty. In West Virginia the rate is 27 percent. It's about one in four in Louisiana, Mississippi, New Mexico and Arkansas.

Mississippi has the highest rate of adults without high school diplomas: one in four. It also has the highest rate of births to unwed mothers — 44 percent.

Nearly one in five school-age children speaks a language other than English at home.