Demographics

Waldenburg district has a population of . , 13.3% of the population are resident foreign nationals.

Most of the population speaks German

German language

German is a West Germanic language, related to and classified alongside English and Dutch. With an estimated 90 – 98 million native speakers, German is one of the world's major languages and is the most widely-spoken first language in the European Union....

 (13,765 or 90.9%), with Italian language

Italian language

Italian is a Romance language spoken mainly in Europe: Italy, Switzerland, San Marino, Vatican City, by minorities in Malta, Monaco, Croatia, Slovenia, France, Libya, Eritrea, and Somalia, and by immigrant communities in the Americas and Australia...

 being second most common (357 or 2.4%) and Albanian

Albanian language

Albanian is an Indo-European language spoken by approximately 7.6 million people, primarily in Albania and Kosovo but also in other areas of the Balkans in which there is an Albanian population, including western Macedonia, southern Montenegro, southern Serbia and northwestern Greece...

 being third (280 or 1.8%). There are 100 people who speak French

French language

French is a Romance language spoken as a first language in France, the Romandy region in Switzerland, Wallonia and Brussels in Belgium, Monaco, the regions of Quebec and Acadia in Canada, and by various communities elsewhere. Second-language speakers of French are distributed throughout many parts...

 and 12 people who speak Romansh.

, the gender distribution of the population was 50.1% male and 49.9% female. The population was made up of 13,352 Swiss citizens (85.4% of the population), and 2,287 non-Swiss residents (14.6%) Of the population in the district 4,601 or about 30.4% were born in the district and lived there in 2000. There were 4,100 or 27.1% who were born in the same canton, while 3,808 or 25.1% were born somewhere else in Switzerland, and 2,180 or 14.4% were born outside of Switzerland.

In there were 114 live births to Swiss citizens and 32 births to non-Swiss citizens, and in same time span there were 129 deaths of Swiss citizens and 7 non-Swiss citizen deaths. Ignoring immigration and emigration, the population of Swiss citizens decreased by 15 while the foreign population increased by 25. There were 8 Swiss men and 4 Swiss women who emigrated from Switzerland. At the same time, there were 47 non-Swiss men and 48 non-Swiss women who immigrated from another country to Switzerland. The total Swiss population change in 2008 (from all sources, including moves across municipal borders) was a decrease of 49 and the non-Swiss population change was an increase of 33 people. This represents a population growth rate of -0.1%.

The age distribution, , in the district is; 1,044 children or 6.7% of the population are between 0 and 6 years old and 2,581 teenagers or 16.5% are between 7 and 19. Of the adult population, 1,738 people or 11.1% of the population are between 20 and 29 years old. 1,882 people or 12.0% are between 30 and 39, 2,638 people or 16.9% are between 40 and 49, and 3,268 people or 20.9% are between 50 and 64. The senior population distribution is 1,822 people or 11.7% of the population are between 65 and 79 years old and there are 666 people or 4.3% who are over 80.

, there were 6,223 people who were single and never married in the municipality. There were 7,489 married individuals, 796 widows or widowers and 635 individuals who are divorced.

There were 1,504 households that consist of only one person and 569 households with five or more people. Out of a total of 5,892 households that answered this question, 25.5% were households made up of just one person and 47 were adults who lived with their parents. Of the rest of the households, there are 1,830 married couples without children, 2,057 married couples with children There were 285 single parents with a child or children. There were 60 households that were made up unrelated people and 109 households that were made some sort of institution or another collective housing.

the average price to rent a two room apartment was about 726.00 CHF (US$580, £330, €460), a three room apartment was about 935.00 CHF (US$750, £420, €600) and a four room apartment cost an average of 1183.00 CHF (US$950, £530, €760).

The historical population is given in the following chart:

Politics

In the 2007 federal election

Swiss federal election, 2007

Elections to the Swiss Federal Assembly, the federal parliament of Switzerland, were held on Sunday, 21 October 2007. In a few cantons, a second round of the elections to the Council of States was held on 11 November, 18 November, and 25 November 2007...

 the most popular party was the SVP

Swiss People's Party

The Swiss People's Party , also known as the Democratic Union of the Centre , is a conservative political party in Switzerland. Chaired by Toni Brunner, but spearheaded by Christoph Blocher, the party is the largest party in the Federal Assembly, with 58 members of the National Council and 6 of...

 which received 39.28% of the vote. The next three most popular parties were the SP

Social Democratic Party of Switzerland

The Social Democratic Party of Switzerland is the largest centre-left political party in Switzerland....

 (20.27%), the FDP

FDP.The Liberals

FDP.The Liberals is a classical liberal political party in Switzerland. It is the joint-largest party in the Federal Council, third-largest party in the National Council, and second-largest in the Council of States....

 (14.58%) and the Green Party

Green Party of Switzerland

The Green Party of Switzerland is the fifth-largest party in the National Council of Switzerland, and the largest party that is not represented on the Federal Council.-History:...

 (13.65%). In the federal election, a total of 5,408 votes were cast, and the voter turnout

Voter turnout

Voter turnout is the percentage of eligible voters who cast a ballot in an election . After increasing for many decades, there has been a trend of decreasing voter turnout in most established democracies since the 1960s...

 was 50.0%.

Religion

From the , 2,714 or 17.9% were Roman Catholic, while 8,987 or 59.3% belonged to the Swiss Reformed Church

Swiss Reformed Church

The Reformed branch of Protestantism in Switzerland was started in Zürich by Huldrych Zwingli and spread within a few years to Basel , Bern , St...

. Of the rest of the population, there were 174 members of an Orthodox church

Orthodox Christianity

The term Orthodox Christianity may refer to:* the Eastern Orthodox Church and its various geographical subdivisions...

 (or about 1.15% of the population), there were 52 individuals (or about 0.34% of the population) who belonged to the Christian Catholic Church

Christian Catholic Church of Switzerland

The Christian Catholic Church of Switzerland is the Swiss member church of the Union of Utrecht, also known as Old Catholic Church, originally founded by the jansenists, with a later influx of discontented Catholics following their disappointment with the First Vatican Council. It has 14,000...

, and there were 501 individuals (or about 3.31% of the population) who belonged to another Christian church. There were 7 individuals (or about 0.05% of the population) who were Jewish

Judaism

Judaism ) is the "religion, philosophy, and way of life" of the Jewish people...

, and 754 (or about 4.98% of the population) who were Islam

Islam

Islam . The most common are and .   : Arabic pronunciation varies regionally. The first vowel ranges from ~~. The second vowel ranges from ~~~...

ic. There were 17 individuals who were Buddhist

Buddhism

Buddhism is a religion and philosophy encompassing a variety of traditions, beliefs and practices, largely based on teachings attributed to Siddhartha Gautama, commonly known as the Buddha . The Buddha lived and taught in the northeastern Indian subcontinent some time between the 6th and 4th...

, 29 individuals who were Hindu

Hinduism

Hinduism is the predominant and indigenous religious tradition of the Indian Subcontinent. Hinduism is known to its followers as , amongst many other expressions...

 and 14 individuals who belonged to another church. 1,419 (or about 9.37% of the population) belonged to no church, are agnostic

Agnosticism

Agnosticism is the view that the truth value of certain claims—especially claims about the existence or non-existence of any deity, but also other religious and metaphysical claims—is unknown or unknowable....

 or atheist

Atheism

Atheism is, in a broad sense, the rejection of belief in the existence of deities. In a narrower sense, atheism is specifically the position that there are no deities...

, and 475 individuals (or about 3.14% of the population) did not answer the question.

Education

In the district about 5,898 or (38.9%) of the population have completed non-mandatory upper secondary education, and 1,568 or (10.4%) have completed additional higher education (either University or a Fachhochschule

Fachhochschule

A Fachhochschule or University of Applied Sciences is a German type of tertiary education institution, sometimes specialized in certain topical areas . Fachhochschulen were founded in Germany and later adopted by Austria, Liechtenstein, Switzerland and Greece...

). Of the 1,568 who completed tertiary schooling, 67.7% were Swiss men, 22.3% were Swiss women, 6.9% were non-Swiss men and 3.1% were non-Swiss women.