OSEDA Reports
Between 2000 and 2010 Missouri’s older population increased more rapidly than the state population overall.
The US Census Bureau‘s release of the 2010 Census Demographic Profile provides insight into population change by age cohort occurring in Missouri. The proportion of Missouri population age 65 and older has increased from 13.5 in 2000 to 14 percent in 2010. The actual number of Missourians 65 and over has increased by approximately 11 percent, from 755,379 in 2000 to nearly 840,000 in 2010. The proportion of the population age 85 and older has increased at an even faster pace of 15 percent in the past decade. In 2000, approximately 99,000 (1.8 percent of the state’s total population) were 85 or older. When the census was conducted in 2010, nearly 114,000 residents of Missouri reported their age as 85 or older comprising 1.9 percent of Missouri’s total population.
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While the 65 and over and 85 and over age cohorts have grown faster than Missouri’s population has grown (11 percent, 15 percent, and 7 percent respectively), patterns of growth within regions and counties are quite varied. Eighty-nine of Missouri’s 115 counties/City of St. Louis, or 77 percent, have experienced an increase in their 65 and over population, ranging from 65 percent increase (5,751 to 9,464 in 2000 and 2010 respectively) in Christian County to a nominal change of .1 in Livingston County in the north central region of the state. Twenty-six counties lost population during the 2000s. These losses range from a nominal loss of .4 in Putnam County, located on Missouri’s northern border, to the City of St. Louis, which lost 26 percent of its senior population. The pattern of the rate of growth in the 85 and older age cohort was more extreme than in the 65 and older cohort. The number of seniors 85+ almost doubled in St. Charles County, growing from 2,373 in 2000 to 4,646 in 2010. Seventy-two Missouri counties, 63 percent, experienced growth ranging from 95 percent in St. Charles to 1.8 percent in southwest Missouri’s Cedar County. Forty-two counties experienced decline in their 85 and older population (ranging from -.2 percent in Macon County to approximately 30 percent in southeast Missouri’s Iron County. Ralls County’s, north of the St. Louis metropolitan area, 85 and older population remained stable at 166.
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A comparison of the Percent Change in Population by County, 2000-2010 for the total population, the 65 and over and the 85 and over populations reveal distinct patterns of overall population growth and decline. Generally, rural counties north of the I-70 corridor and in Missouri’s Bootheel are losing population across age cohorts with some interesting exceptions: For example, Buchanan County (St. Joseph) experienced an overall population increase and an increase in the age 85 and older cohort. However, Buchanan County lost population in the 65 and over cohort, suggesting ‘young’ seniors with the financial security to relocate upon retirement age are leaving the area while the ‘old old’ are more likely to remain. Whereas the general trend in the Bootheel for some decades has been population decline, Mississippi County, consistently one of the poorest counties in Missouri and the nation, has maintained its population general and in the 65 and older age cohort, while losing population in the 85 and older cohort indicating the impact of extreme poverty on mobility and life expectancy.
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Generally, senior populations in Missouri’s micropolitan and metropolitan counties have been more likely to grow and grow at a relatively faster rate than the population overall. However, the most notable change in population growth in the 65 and over and 85 and over age cohorts in the past decade has been the continued in-migration of seniors to Missouri’s lakes region – extending from the Lake of the Ozark’s northern edge of Morgan and Benton Counties to Stone, Taney and Ozark Counties on the Arkansas border and home to Lakes Tablerock and Taneycomo.
This file last modified Thursday June 23, 2011, 17:20:30
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OSEDA, Office of Social and Economic Data Analysis Telephone: (573)882-7396
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