U.S. Is Becoming More Urban and More Ethnically Diverse, Says Census Bureau

"U.S. population is much more multiracial and more diverse than what we measured in the past," said Nicholas Jones, the Census Bureau's director of race and ethnicity research, in a press release today.

According to last year's census data, whites remain the country's largest racial or ethnic group. About 204.3 million people described themselves as white without also identifying with another group. (Another 31.1 million Americans identified both as white and with another group.) Still, the population identifying as white alone decreased by 8.6 percent since the previous census in 2010.

America's second largest ethnic group? People who either picked multiple racial boxes or checked "Some Other Race." These folks now number 49.9 million—surpassing the African-American population, which now stands at 46.9 million.

The fact that more Americans are checking multiracial census boxes tracks the steady increase in racial and ethnic group intermarriages over the past 50 years.