| July 15, 2005 If Alaska Were A Village Of 1,000 People by Rich Seifert, sustainalaska.org  We’d be: 693 Caucasians 34 African-Americans 156 Alaska Natives and Indians 40 Asians 41 Hispanic 36 other races and ethnic groups 517 of us would be male, and 483 female. We would have some difficulty communicating with each other: 143 of us speak a language other than English at home. In addition, 128 of us (12.8%) are considered to be functionally illiterate, and cannot read or write well enough to function well in our society (Alaska Literacy Council estimate). Nearly one third of us, 310, are under the age of 19, and only 56 of us are over age 65. We look much like the demographic profile of a third world country. We are second in the nation in proportion of youthful population, and by 2025, we’ll have the highest proportion of young people in our population in the United States. Educationally, we are very well off. 88.3% of us over the age of 25 are high school graduates, and 24.7% have bachelor’s degrees or higher. One of every four persons in the village is a school age student and most are enrolled in the public school system. However, Alaska presently has the lowest rate in the nation of high school graduates going to college the first year after graduation. Several people have died of AIDS in our village, and although we have one housing unit for every 2.4 people, in rural Alaska one house in three still lacks complete plumbing facilities. The median household income in the community is $51,571 (2004$), but 134 of us live below the poverty line as determined by US government definitions, and more than half of those are below 18 years of age. This poverty is spread over all age groups, so although wealth is not evenly spread, the poverty seems to be. Nearly 30% of all households are headed by single persons living alone, many with children, and only half by married couples. Average per capita income has dropped rapidly, and is now below the federal poverty line. Our poverty line is at $22,660. Yet 27% of the households who are buying their homes pay more than $1500 per month, and 8.3% pay more than $2000 per month in mortgage payments. 16% of Alaskans have no health insurance coverage at all. There are actually more motor vehicles registered in Alaska than there are people (801,339-DMV, 12/2004). The number of pickup trucks is nearly equal to the number of houses. There is one state trooper, four lawyers, and nine people are either prison inmates or are in halfway houses. Virtually all these prisoners are male (92%). We also have 103 soldiers and Air Force personnel (a number which includes their dependents). There are also about the same number of service veterans in our village (110), including the largest proportion of Vietnam veterans of any community. Water is a problem for many people, and although there is a lot of it, the quality can be problematic. Stream water quality is excellent. Subsistence fisheries take 2.5% of the harvest, and another 1% is taken by sport fishermen. The rest, the overwhelming portion of 96.5% is taken by commercial fisheries. Our village typically has many more births than deaths, and in the past ten years, we have increased our population by nearly 30%. We have twice the national suicide rate and die from accidents one and a half times more often than average Americans. Each of us received $919 in October 2004 as the Alaska Permanent Fund Dividend and each recipient has equity of about $46,600 in the Alaska Permanent Fund. Our community is very wealthy compared to most of the world. Still, in some parts of the community, the Alaska PFD is 15% of the per capita income. Next year, our population will be three percent more than this year. Very likely, at the present rate, at least one of those newborns will have fetal alcohol syndrome (5 babies per thousand for Alaska Natives are FAS.) Sources:
2000 U.S. Census, and updated in December 2004
“Trends in Alaska’s People and Economy”, ISER, UAA |
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2005
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Reserved. in-sur-gent (in sur'jent), n. 1. a member of a group which revolts against the policies of its leadership. |
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