In 2022, the state with the highest median age of its population was Maine at 45.1 years. Utah had the lowest median age at 32.1 years. View the distribution of the U.S. population by ethnicity here.

Additional information on the aging population in the United States

High birth rates during the so-called baby boom years that followed World War II followed by lower fertility and morality rates have left the United States with a serious challenge in the 21st Century. However, the issue of an aging population is certainly not an issue unique to the United States. The age distribution of the global population shows that other parts of the world face a similar issue.

Within the United States, the uneven distribution of populations aged 65 years and over among states offers both major challenges and potential solutions. On the one hand, federal action over the issue may be contentious as other states are set to harbor the costs of elderly care in states such as California and Florida. That said, domestic migration from comparably younger states may help to fill gaps in the workforce left by retirees in others.

Nonetheless, aging population issues are set to gain further prominence in the political and economic decisions made by policymakers regardless of the eventual distribution of America’s elderly. Analysis of the financial concerns of Americans by age shows many young people still decades from retirement hold strong concern over their eventual financial position.

As of 2023, the youngest member of the United States Senate was John Ossoff, at 35 years old. Although the minimum age requirement to run for a Senate seat is **, all but two Senate members in the ***** U.S. Congress were over 40 years old.

Since 1789, 45 different men have served as President of the United States, and the average age of these men when taking office for the first time was approximately 57 years. Two men, Grover Cleveland and Donald Trump, were elected to two non-consecutive terms, and Donald Trump's victory in 2024 made him the oldest man ever elected as president, where he will be 78 years and seven months old when taking office again. Record holders The oldest president to take office for the first time was Joe Biden in 2021, at 78 years and two months - around five months younger than Donald Trump when he assumes office in 2025. The youngest presidents to take office were Theodore Roosevelt in 1901 (42 years and 322 days), who assumed office following the assassination of William McKinley, and the youngest elected president was John F Kennedy in 1961 (43 years and 236 days). Historically, there seems to be little correlation between age and electability, and the past five presidents have included the two oldest to ever take office, and two of the youngest. Requirements to become president The United States Constitution states that both the President and Vice President must be at least 35 years old when taking office, and must have lived in the United States for at least 14 years of their life. Such restrictions are also in place for members of the U.S. Congress, although the age and residency barriers are lower. Additionally, for the roles of President and Vice President, there is a "natural-born-citizen" clause that was traditionally interpreted to mean candidates must have been born in the U.S. (or were citizens when the Constitution was adopted). However, the clause's ambiguity has led to something of a reinterpretation in the past decades, with most now interpreting it as also applying to those eligible for birthright citizenship, as some recent candidates were born overseas.

As of 2023, the youngest member of the United States House of Representatives was Maxwell Alejandro Frost. Elected at **, Frost was the first and only Generation Z member of the ***** U.S. Congress. There was a considerable age gap between Frost and the other youngest members of the House of Representatives, who were all between 33 and 34 years old.

According to Article II: Section one of the United States Constitution, the President of the United States (as well as the Vice President) must be at least 35 years of age, and have lived in the country for at least 14 years when taking office. Requirements for the House of Representatives and the Senate are also outlined in the Constitution, in Article I: Sections two and three, although figures are lower. There is no minimum age for Supreme Court Justices given in the constitution. Terms and term lengths The President of the United States is elected for a term of four years, and may hold office for a maximum of two terms (Franklin D. Roosevelt is the only president to have served more than two terms, as an exception was made during the Second World War). There is no maximum number of terms for Vice Presidents, who may hypothetically serve in the role under a number of presidents, although no Vice President has ever served more than two full terms. In the event of a President's death or removal from office, the Vice President would then assume the presidency - if the remaining term time is less than two years then this person may seek two further terms in the presidency, giving a maximum term length of 10 years (although this has never happened). For representatives and senators, there is no maximum number of terms providing the candidate wins re-election. Some states did have term limits in the past, but these were invalidated in 1995 when the Supreme Court ruled that no state can impose stricter qualifications than those outlined in the Constitution. The longest-serving Senator was Robert Byrd, who served for over 51 years between 1959 and 2010, while the longest-serving Representative was John Dingell Jr., who served for over 59 years between 1955 and 2015. As appointments to the Supreme Court are lifetime appointments, they are not restricted by term lengths or limits. Natural-born-citizen clause Unlike the other roles, the Constitution includes a "natural-born-citizen" clause in reference to the President and Vice President, where a person must have been born in the U.S. (or be a citizen at the time of the Constitution's adoption) to be eligible for either role. This was included to prevent unwanted foreign influence at the highest level of U.S. government. Historically, there were few challenges to this clause, however, as there is no clear definition of what makes a natural-born-citizen, it has been addressed several times in the past two decades. This was most notable in the 2008 election, where John McCain's status was called into question since he was born in the United States' Panama Canal Zone, while Barack Obama's eligibility was questioned due to a widely-discredited conspiracy theory that he was born in Kenya (this became known as the "birther movement"). Since 2016, questions were raised over candidates such as Ted Cruz and Tulsi Gabbard, who acquired U.S. citizenship through their parents - since this time it has become more widely accepted that those who qualify for birthright citizenship should also be considered natural-born-citizens.

As of 2025, the average age of senators in the 119th Congress was **. Of the total 100, ** members of the U.S. Senate were between the ages of ** and ** - more than any other age group. The minimum age requirement to be a member of the Senate is **, opposed to the House of Representatives which has a minimum age requirement of **. The average age of members of Congress from 2009 to 2023 can be found here.

This statistic contains data on the estimated median age of Americans at their first wedding in the United States in 2021, by race and origin. In 2021, the median age for the first wedding among Asian women stood at 28.8 years.

Since 1789, the United States has had 45 different men serve as president, of which five are still alive today. At 78 years and two months, Joe Biden became the oldest man to ascend to the presidency for the first time in 2021, however Donald Trump was older when he re-entered the White House, at 78 years and seven months. Eight presidents have died while in office, including four who were assassinated by gunshot, and four who died of natural causes. The president who died at the youngest age was John F. Kennedy, who was assassinated at 46 years old in Texas in 1963; Kennedy was also the youngest man ever elected to the office of president. The longest living president in history is Jimmy Carter, who celebrated his 100th birthday in just before his death in 2024. The youngest currently-living president is Barack Obama, who turned 63 in August 2024. Coincidentally, presidents Clinton, Bush Jr., and Trump were all born within 66 days of one another, between June and August 1946. George Washington The U.S.' first president, George Washington, died after developing a severe inflammation of the throat, which modern scholars suspect to have been epiglottitis. However, many suspect that it was the treatments used to treat this illness that ultimately led to his death. After spending a prolonged period in cold and wet weather, Washington fell ill and ordered his doctor to let one pint of blood from his body. As his condition deteriorated, his doctors removed a further four pints in an attempt to cure him (the average human has between eight and twelve pints of blood in their body). Washington passed away within two days of his first symptoms showing, leading many to believe that this was due to medical malpractice and not due to the inflammation in his throat. Bloodletting was one of the most common and accepted medical practices from ancient Egyptian and Greek times until the nineteenth century, when doctors began to realize how ineffective it was; today, it is only used to treat extremely rare conditions, and its general practice is heavily discouraged. Zachary Taylor Another rare and disputed cause of death for a U.S. president was that of Zachary Taylor, who died sixteen months into his first term in office. Taylor had been celebrating the Fourth of July in the nation's capital in 1850, where he began to experience stomach cramps after eating copious amounts of cherries, other fruits, and iced milk. As his condition worsened, he drank a large amount of water in an attempt to alleviate his symptoms, but to no avail. Taylor died of gastroenteritis five days later, after being treated with a heavy dose of drugs and bloodletting. The most commonly accepted theories for his illness are that the ice used in the milk and the water consumed afterwards were contaminated with cholera, and that this was further exacerbated by the large amounts of acid in his system from eating so much fruit. There are some suggestions that recovery was feasible, but the actions of his doctors had made this impossible. Additionally, there have been conspiracy theories suggesting that Taylor was poisoned by pro-slavery secessionists from the Southern States, although there appears to be no evidence to back this up.

Of the 44 men who have served as President of the United States, eight died while in office, while 31 passed away after their term had ended. Five presidents, including incumbent President Donald Trump, are still alive today. The most common state in which U.S. presidents have died was New York, which has seen the deaths of nine U.S. presidents. A total of fourteen presidents have passed away in the same state in which they were born, which includes all four who passed away in Virginia, but none of those who did so in Washington D.C. Although seven presidents were born in Ohio, Rutherford B. Hayes is the only to have passed away in this state. The most recent presidential death occurred in November 2018, when George H. W. Bush passed away in his family home in Houston, Texas. At 94 years old, Bush Sr. had been the oldest living president at the time of his death; however that title has since passed to Jimmy Carter, who will turn 96 years old in October 2020. John F. Kennedy was the president who died at the youngest age, when he was assassinated at 46 years old; while James K. Polk was the youngest president to die of natural causes, at 53 years of age.

In 1991, the birth rate for girls aged 10 to 14 years in the United States stood at 1.4 births per every thousand girls. Since 1991, this rate has consistently decreased, dropping to .2 in the year 2023. This statistic depicts the number of births per thousand U.S. females aged 10 to 14 years between 1991 and 2023. Teenage pregnancy and contraception Over the years, the rate of teenage pregnancy and birth has declined in the United States, most likely due to lower rates of sexual activity in this age group as well as increased use of birth control methods. However, the use and accessibility of contraceptives remains a problem in many parts of the United States. For example, in 2021, only 21 percent of sexually active high school students reported using the birth control pill to prevent pregnancy before their last sexual intercourse. This rate was highest among white high students and lowest among Black students, with only 11 percent reporting use of the birth control pill before their last intercourse. Condom use is more prevalent among high school students than use of the pill, but still only just over half of high school students reported using a condom the last time they had sex as of 2021. Disparities in teenage pregnancy Although rates have decreased over the past decades, teenage pregnancy and birth rates in the U.S. are still higher than in other Western countries. Geographic, racial, and ethnic disparities in teen birth rates are still prevalent within the country. In 2023, teenage birth rates were highest among Native Hawaiian and Pacific Islanders. Other contributing factors to high teen birth rates also include poor socioeconomic conditions, low education, and low-income status.

Nigeria has the largest population in Africa. As of 2025, the country counted over 237.5 million individuals, whereas Ethiopia, which ranked second, has around 135.5 million inhabitants. Egypt registered the largest population in North Africa, reaching nearly 118.4 million people. In terms of inhabitants per square kilometer, Nigeria only ranked seventh, while Mauritius had the highest population density on the whole African continent in 2023. The fastest-growing world region Africa is the second most populous continent in the world, after Asia. Nevertheless, Africa records the highest growth rate worldwide, with figures rising by over two percent every year. In some countries, such as Chad, South Sudan, Somalia, and the Central African Republic, the population increase peaks at over 3.4 percent. With so many births, Africa is also the youngest continent in the world. However, this coincides with a low life expectancy. African cities on the rise The last decades have seen high urbanization rates in Asia, mainly in China and India. African cities are also growing at large rates. Indeed, the continent has three megacities and is expected to add four more by 2050. Furthermore, Africa's fastest-growing cities are forecast to be Bujumbura, in Burundi, and Zinder, Nigeria, by 2035.

The estimated per capita income across Sikkim was the highest among Indian states at around *** thousand Indian rupees in the financial year 2024. Meanwhile, it was the lowest in the northern state of Bihar at over ** thousand rupees. India’s youngest state, Telangana stood in the fifth place. The country's average per capita income that year was an estimated *** thousand rupees. What is per capita income? Per capita income is a measure of the average income earned per person in a given area in a certain period. It is calculated by dividing the area's total income by its total population. If absolute numbers are noted, India’s per capita income doubled from the financial year 2015 to 2023. Wealth inequality However, as per economists, the increase in the per capita income of a country does not always reflect an increase in the income of the entire population. Wealth distribution in India remains highly skewed. The average income hides the disbursal and inequality in a society. Especially in a society like India where the top one percent owned over ** percent of the total wealth in 2022.

In 2023, there were about 5.81 million males and 5.56 million females between the ages of 25 and 44 living in Canada, which was the most out of any age group. The next largest age group was between the ages of 45 and 64, with 5.01 million males and 5.11 million females.

Canadian demographics

The average age of the Canadian resident population was about 40.6 years in 2023, with Newfoundland and Labrador having the oldest average population, and Nunavut having the youngest average population. Additionally, the majority of Canadians in 2022, both males and females, are single. The next largest group of Canadians are married, and not separated.

Immigration to Canada

Much like the United States, Canada is an immigrant nation, and many of its residents have immigrant backgrounds. Additionally, immigration to Canada has been steadily increasing since 2000, making the country a diverse melting pot for people of all backgrounds.

Between 1970 and June 16, 2020, 175 school shootings were perpetrated by 17-year-olds. 16-year-olds perpetrated the second highest number of school shootings, with 163 shootings.