At the census of 7 March 1923, the Austrian Republic had a present population of 6,535,759 residents, Distributed very differently in the 9 confederate countries (Bundesländer) or autonomous administrative districts, into which the Republic is divided today (Vienna, Lower Austria, Upper Austria, Salzburg, Styria, Carinthia, Tyrol, Vorarlberg, Burgenland). The average population density is therefore 78 residents per sq. km. (85.2 if unproductive areas are subtracted), slightly higher than that of France (71 per sq. Km.), But lower than that of Switzerland and Italy (94 and 125 residents per sq. Km.). The administrative districts are very different from each other, both for the area, which varies – excluding Vienna (278 sq. Km) including only the city and the suburban territory – from 19,301 sq. Km. in Lower Austria, at 2602 in Vorarlberg, and above all for the different nature and morphology of the soil and therefore the different habitability of the territory, since the uncultivated, which together represent 10.5% of the whole Austria, in the various districts they fluctuate from a maximum of 24.8% in Tyrol to a minimum of 3.3% in Lower Austria. Thus the absolute and relative population figures are very different from province to province.
The average increase in the population, which had always increased from 1880 onwards, reaching, in the decade before the war (1900-1910), the total value of 11% – especially intense in the western provinces (Salzburg 11.4 %, Tyrol 14.4%, Vorarlberg 12.5%) – was abruptly interrupted by the European conflict; so that in the decade 1910-1920 there was a notable regression, which reached – 3.6% in the whole state, with a maximum decrease in Vienna (- 9.33%) and in Vorarlberg (- 8.5%), while Tyrol and Upper Austria still maintained a slight increase (+ 0.5%). This decrease, which affected almost the entire territory, was largely due to war deaths, as shown by the fact that in males it was -6%, while in females it was just 0.7%; however, a large part is also due to the exodus of many non-German subjects of the ex-monarchy, especially in the industrial centers and in the capital: during the post-war crisis, these returned to their countries of origin, which had acquired the political independence. But in recent times the balance has been re-establishing itself, so much so that in the 3 years between the census of 1920 and that of 1923, the increase of the population returned positive in all the provinces (maximum in Vorarlberg + 5.1%, Salzburg + 4.1%, in the whole state + 1.7), except in Burgenland, where the population decreased by – 3.1% of its population, due to the exodus of the Hungarian elements. For Austria religion, please check thereligionfaqs.com.
Thus in 1923 compared to 1910, the Austrian territory showed a decrease of the population, but of only – 1.7%, remaining really negative only the percentages of increase, of Vienna (- 8,2), of Vorarlberg (- 3, 2), Burgenland (- 1.9), Carinthia (- 0.2).
The restoration of the demographic equilibrium is mainly due to the natural increase (difference between the born and the dead), since if in 1919, the immediate postwar year, there was a negative variation of – 2.14 per 1000 residents later, in 1920, it returned to a positive + 3.36, in 1921 + 6.03 and in 1922 + 45.48, very close to the overall pre-war one (for the currently Austrian provinces: + 5.43, in 1913). This is mainly due to the birth rate (22.70, in 1922), which almost reached that of the pre-war period (23.54, in 1913), with high coefficients, especially in Carinthia (30.50), in Salzburg (28.0) and in Burgenland (32.27), lowest in Vienna (16.39) and in Lower Austria (22.47), where the city and industrial centers are more numerous.
Mortality, which in 1919 had reached 20.33 per 1000 in the whole state, in 1922 had dropped to 17.27 per 1000, a value lower than that of the pre-war period (18, 15); with minimums in Vorarlberg (15.09), in Vienna (16.03), in Lower Austria (16.23), in Tyrol (16.89), and relative maximums in Burgenland (19.92), in Upper Austria (19:33) and in Styria (19, 10).
As for the composition of the population, in 1923 there were 1076 women out of 1000 men in Austria, with a maximum in Vienna (1169) and a minimum in Burgenland (1024).
From the ethnic point of view, Austria, of all the successor states of the Habsburg monarchy, is the one that has the greatest homogeneity, since the Germans in 1920 represented 89.4% of the entire population; the other peoples were represented by 3% of Jews living especially in Vienna, by 5.3% of Cèchi (350,000), distributed in industrial centers and in Vienna itself, by 1.7% of Slovenes (75,000) who are found especially in Carinthia (37,000), and 1.1% of other nationalities. The non-Germans, calculated in October 1920, were 668,926 (10.6% of the entire population), but perhaps today there are quite different figures and ratios (although there is no more recent census), following the migratory movement which occurred in the postwar, and even more following the infusion of 42.
The German of Austria is a Bavarian altered in place, due to the mountain isolation and perhaps due to the contact with the ancient settlers: it spreads compactly over all the Alpine valleys, up to the last buttresses, towards the Hungarian Plain, to the West. and no. of the Klagen basin. stealth However, the lower Gail valley and the areas south of Lake Wörth and east of Klagenfurt, the eastern foothills area, where the Slavs, squeezed by the Magyars, occupy the hilly region mixed with the Germans, remain Slovenian.
Relatively numerous are the Israelites in the Austrian Republic, especially in the cities and capital where they dominate in the business world, in the press and in literature. In Vienna, in 1910 there were 175,318, but in 1923 they had grown to 201,513, 57.7% from abroad; therefore they now represented 10.8% of the entire population of the capital. Among these it is necessary to distinguish those who have been assimilated for long periods of residence in Austria and the Eastern Israelites (Ostjuden), who came, especially in the post-war period, from Galicia or from formerly Russian Poland, which dedicated themselves to petty trade and speculation. Their number is not exactly established, but they are estimated to be around 50,000. Recently the Israelites have increased due to the annexation of Burgenland, where 3790 were registered in 1923, while others emigrated from Budapest and the Hungarian committees, so that the total number of Israelites in the republic today represents perhaps 5% of the population.
As for religion, based on the 1910 census, today’s Austria can be said to be a predominantly Catholic state, since Catholics represent 94.1% of the population, while Jews (without Ostjuden) represent 3.1%, especially grouped in Vienna and Lower Austria. Protestants make up about 2.6% of the residents, and are found above all in Vienna, where in 1923 they were 4.8% of its population; while they are 6.5% in Carinthia, 2.6% in Lower Austria, and only 0.9% in Tyrol. 0.3% of the population is of other or no religion (in Vienna, in 1923, 1.77% of declared religious).
People over the age of 10, who could read and write, in 1910, represented 95.7%, with a maximum in Vorarlberg (99.1%) and a minimum in Carinthia (85.4%); it can therefore be said that the entire population is literate, so much so that since the 1910 census this survey was no longer carried out.
As regards the social structure of the Austrian population, 43% is devoted to agriculture and forests, 33% to industry, 16% to commerce and 8% to free professions or employment. The prevailing occupations are therefore agricultural ones, especially since the industries are concentrated mainly in the centers of Lower Austria, the mining ones in Styria. From a statistic of occupations divided by provinces in 1900, it can be deduced that the largest number of residents dedicated to agriculture and forests was in Carinthia (58.4%), followed by North Tyrol (48.9%) and Upper Austria (49.4%); the lows were represented by Lower Austria (43.5%, without Vienna, and Upper Styria (40%); while an absolute minimum was given by Vorarlberg (34.3%).
Industrial activity, on the other hand, absorbed the maximum number of hands in Vorarlberg (46.1%), especially in the textile industry (23.3%); it was followed by Upper Styria (37.2%) with the highest percentage of residents employed in mines (14.9%), and Lower Austria (without Vienna) with 32.9% industrial population (6.3% in metallurgy).
Excluding the major centers of Vienna (26.6%) and Graz (21.4%), the trade and transport industries occupied the largest number of residents in Salzburg (12.4%) and the least in Carinthia (7%) and in Lower Styria (6.2%); while the free professions had numerous representatives (always excluding the big cities) in Salzburg (17.4%) and scarce in Vorarlberg (10.6%).
These data, however, underwent profound changes, especially in the cities, after the war; In fact, the clerical class and the one dedicated to commerce decreased considerably, and the agricultural class increased in part, with a reverse movement to that which had occurred in the last years before the war.
