The bar chart illustrates the percentage of residents who live alone across five different age categories in the US between 1850 and 2000.
Overall, the highest figure across the period was people aged 55-64. Other categories increased steadily, while in the last two years individuals aged 17-26 who lived alone started to rise.
Looking at the details, in 1850 the figure for those aged 37-46 was just over 2%. Throughout 1900 and 1950 it remained stable, before rising to just over 6% in the final year. The 47-54 aged category followed the same pattern, starting at over 2% in 1850 and increasing significantly to well over 12% in 2000. Moreover, those aged 55-64 in 1850 showed around 3% and remained stable till 1900. However, in 1950 it started to rise sharply to over 9% and peaked at well over 17% in 2000.
By contrast, other figures such as 17-26 and 27-36 aged individuals represented a relatively similar pattern. The 27-36 category started at approximately 2%, and in the following year showed a slight increase to just over 3%. This figure then massively increased to 6%, respectively. In addition, the percentage of adolescents aged 17-26 was only around 1.5%, but by the end of the period significantly rose to around 5%. It was the lowest figure in the half of the period.