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Demographics of Taunton, MA
Affluence Level in Taunton, MA
A middle-class area roughly in line with national averages across income, home values, education, and employment.
People of Taunton, MA
The people of Taunton, MA today number 59,719, forming a dense, historically rooted city that feels more like a working-class New England hub than a Boston suburb. Its population is predominantly white (72.1%), with a notable Hispanic minority (9.1%) and a Black community (6.9%) that has deep local roots. The city is less educated than the state average—only 24.4% hold a college degree—and its foreign-born share is low at 5.4%, giving Taunton a distinctly native-born, multi-generational character. Residents often describe it as a place where old Yankee families, Portuguese-American descendants, and newer Latino arrivals coexist in distinct neighborhoods, creating a patchwork of ethnic enclaves rather than a fully blended melting pot.
How the city was settled and grew
Taunton was founded in 1637 by English Puritan settlers from the Massachusetts Bay Colony, who purchased the land from the Wampanoag tribe. The original settlement clustered around the Taunton River, where water power drove early ironworks and shipbuilding. By the 18th and 19th centuries, the city became a manufacturing center for textiles, silver, and machinery, drawing successive waves of immigrants. The first major non-English group was the Irish, who arrived in large numbers during the 1840s potato famine and settled in the Weir Village district, working in the mills along the river. French-Canadians followed in the late 19th century, taking jobs in the textile factories and establishing a strong presence in East Taunton, where St. Mary’s Church became a cultural anchor. Portuguese immigrants from the Azores and Madeira began arriving around 1900, concentrating in the Whittenton neighborhood, where they built a tight-knit community centered on the Holy Family Church. These three groups—Irish, French-Canadian, and Portuguese—formed the backbone of Taunton’s working class through the mid-20th century, with each neighborhood retaining a distinct ethnic identity that persists today.
Modern era (post-1965)
The 1965 Hart-Cellar Act opened immigration from new regions, but Taunton’s foreign-born population remained low compared to gateway cities. Instead, the city experienced domestic in-migration from Boston and Providence as families sought affordable housing. The Hispanic population grew from negligible numbers in 1970 to 9.1% today, with most arrivals being Puerto Ricans and Dominicans who settled in the Downtown area and the Westville neighborhood, where older triple-deckers offered cheap rentals. The Black population, at 6.9%, includes both long-standing African American families and a smaller number of recent African immigrants, concentrated in the North Taunton area near the Myles Standish Industrial Park. East/Southeast Asian residents (0.8%) and Indian-subcontinent residents (0.7%) remain tiny communities, mostly professionals living in the newer subdivisions off Route 140. The white population, while still the majority, has aged and declined slightly as younger families move to more affordable exurbs. The Portuguese-American community, once the city’s largest ethnic group, has largely assimilated into the white demographic, though its cultural imprint remains strong in Whittenton and East Taunton.
The future
Taunton’s population is slowly diversifying, but the pace is modest. The Hispanic share is projected to rise to 12-14% by 2035, driven by natural increase and continued migration from Puerto Rico and Central America, with most growth occurring in Downtown and Westville. The Black population is stable, with little new immigration. The white population will continue to shrink as older residents pass away and younger whites leave for cheaper rural towns. The city is not tribalizing into hostile enclaves, but neighborhoods remain ethnically distinct: Whittenton is still heavily Portuguese-American, East Taunton retains its French-Canadian character, and Downtown is becoming increasingly Latino. The foreign-born share may inch up to 7-8% as a trickle of Brazilian and Haitian immigrants arrive, but Taunton will not become a major immigrant destination. The biggest demographic shift is likely to be the continued suburbanization of the Lakeville border area, where new single-family homes attract white and Hispanic families alike, blurring old ethnic lines.
For someone moving in now, Taunton is a stable, working-class city where ethnic identity still matters but is softening with each generation. The low college attainment and modest foreign-born share mean the city feels more like a traditional New England mill town than a cosmopolitan suburb. New arrivals will find a place where neighborhoods have distinct personalities—Whittenton for Portuguese festivals, Downtown for Latino groceries, East Taunton for quiet residential streets—and where the population is slowly becoming more diverse without losing its blue-collar roots.
* Values derived from national, state, county, city and local statistics and may differ in a specific area. Last updated: 2026-05-01T07:34:21.000Z
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