Why do some places have so many more missing African-American men than others?

In a recent article, we detailed a severe demographic imbalance: There are 1.5 million fewer prime-age black men (25 to 54) living in their communities than black women, census data show. The largest causes of the trend appear to be higher incarceration rates and higher mortality rates for black men than for any other large demographic group. But the extent to which black men are outnumbered by black women varies tremendously across the country.

State by state, the largest disparities are evident in Alabama, New York, Illinois, Mississippi and Georgia: In each state there are fewer than 78 prime-age African-American men living in households for each 100 black women. Add Arkansas, Maryland, South Carolina, North Carolina, Louisiana, New Jersey, Delaware, Pennsylvania and Missouri to the list, and there are 14 states in which there are fewer than 80 prime-age black men living in households for each 100 black women.

These states are drawn from the South, the Midwest and the Mid-Atlantic region, and are among the most populous states. Most important, these are all places where a large share of the population is African-American.

By contrast, there are 18 states in which the number of prime-age black men living in households actually outnumber black women. These states — Montana, South Dakota, Hawaii, Idaho, Wyoming, North Dakota, Utah, Maine, New Hampshire, Vermont, New Mexico, Alaska, Oregon, Washington, Colorado, West Virginia, Iowa and Arizona — are mostly smaller in population, with relatively fewer black residents.