Also, Christine asked about how I extracted numbers from the Pew survey on the unchurched, which made me realize I'd forgotten to write about assumptions and method, as I'd intended. The basic assumptions; the two surveys are accurate and reliable, and the Pew survey includes both churched (member) and unchurched UUs in proper proportions, as well as that the two data sets, taken four years apart, represent pretty much the same population. I think all of those are reasonable, but any one of them might be questioned.
It's that second assumption that the actual math rests on. If member UUs are represented in Pew's sample in proper proportion to the overall population, and non-member UUs are as well, then we can take the Pew number, subtract the UUA's adult membership data, and discover how many unchurched UUs there are (the "wild" and "feral" populations). This, in fact, is what was done in the post I linked to in Transient and Permanent. When I saw that post, and the data from UU World, I realized that one could do some fairly simple algebra; we had the Pew numbers (UUs at large) and the UU World data (member UUs). Backing out the UU World numbers from the Pew numbers would give the numbers for the free range UUs. If the two sub-population were the same size, I'd simply have subtracted (Pew - UU World = unknown). Transient and Permanent's insight that there were three free range UUs for every member UU (actually, just over three--the numbers are 76% free range and 24% members--since I don't believe that the numbers we're working with are that precise, I worked with the 3:1 ratio) just required weighting the numbers. Thus the actual formula looks like 4(Pew) = UU World + 3(unknown) -- the need to multiply Pew's number is because we're working in percentages, not absolute numbers.
-------------------------
On Facebook this morning, Chris Walton posted a link that I'd previously missed at UU World, a comparison of data from two polls, one by UU World in 2004 and one by Pew Research in 2008. Both look at reported data from UUs. What's fascinating are the differences....
I am indebted as well to this posting at Transient and Permanent, which mulled over some of the Pew data three years ago.
Here's the basic data:
|
| UU World | Pew Research |
| Income |
|
|
| < $30,000 | 14% | 19% |
| $30k–$49,999 | 13% | 25% |
| $50k–$74,999 | 19% | 16% |
| $75k–$99,999 | 16% | 13% |
| $100,000> | 25% | 26% |
| No response | 13% |
|
|
|
|
|
| Education |
|
|
| < high school | 0% | 3% |
| High school | 2% | 16% |
| Some college | 11% | 30% |
| College grad. | 20% | 22% |
| Post-graduate | 65% | 29% |
| No response |
|
|
|
|
|
|
| Gender |
|
|
| Male | 31% | 54% |
| Female | 65% | 46% |
| No answer | 4% |
|
|
|
|
|
| Age |
|
|
| Under 30* | 4% | 18% |
| Over 65 | 29% | 16% |
Pew surveyed some large number of Americans and calculated that there were, as of 2008, some 683,000 UUs. Adult UUs. Given the data from the UUA at the time, Transient and Permanent observed that this meant that there were just over three UUs out there, unchurched (but familiar enough with us to claim to be UUs) for every one of us who's on the books as a member. That's a startling number.
The Pew data alone is striking. In the population at large, slightly over half of those affirming they're UUs are male. But no more than a third of those who are members are male. Given the imperfect overlap on the age ranges, it looks like there are five times as many under 30s who say they're UUs as are members. Etc., etc. The numbers clearly indicate that there's a very real difference between the different UU populations, the unchurched--what worker referred to as "free range," recently--and the churched.
And then it hit me. The Pew survey wasn't of the unchurched. It's of those who responded that they were UUs; members and not, both. The difference between the churched and unchurched would be even more extreme. So I did some number crunching (after having sufficient coffee, because uncaffeinated this morning, I managed the trick of multiplying billions by two (I think that's what I did, anyway; it's irreproducible) and came up with trillions). What I did was to figure out what the unchurched population would have to have responded with in order for Pew to get its numbers after adding in the churched part of its sample. (Note to self: Take this back to the kids to prove that there are occasional adult uses for algebra.)
The numbers are, of course, imperfect; there are rounding errors, and such. So columns do *not* add up to 100%, etc.
|
| Churched | Unchurched |
| Total UU pop | 24% | 76% |
|
|
|
|
| Income |
|
|
| < $30,000 | 14% | 20% |
| $30k–$49,999 | 13% | 29% |
| $50k–$74,999 | 19% | 15% |
| $75k–$99,999 | 16% | 12% |
| $100,000> | 25% | 26% |
| No response | 13% |
|
|
|
|
|
| Education |
|
|
| < high school | 0% | 4% |
| High school | 2% | 21% |
| Some college | 11% | 36% |
| College grad. | 20% | 23% |
| Post-graduate | 65% | 17% |
| No response | 3% |
|
|
|
|
|
| Gender |
|
|
| Male | 31% | 62% |
| Female | 65% | 40% |
| No answer 4 | 4% |
|
|
|
|
|
| Age |
|
|
| Under 30* | 4% | 23% |
| Over 65 | 29% | 20% |
The classism that some of us have talked about becomes more apparent when we look at what economic class member UUs are likely to be in, versus non-member UUs. Ouch. Interestingly, the people in the upper middle class-to-wealthy range are the only group that seems unaffected. They're equally likely to be UUs.
Education is even more striking. That's where the real class boundary is stunningly apparent. Mark Morrison-Reed's analysis that education is the single best marker for whether one is likely to be a (member) UU is clearly on the money. Ouch, ouch.
Gender... ok, so it's not news to anyone that the outwardly religious have been predominately female for well over a century. It thus isn't surprising to see that UU members are two-thirds women. But if it was a surprise that over half of those who say they're UUs are male, to find that three out of five people who are unchurched UUs are male was startling.
And then there's the age data.
So what's the picture look like--in very crude, simplistic averages?
Church-going UUs are relatively well-off, extremely well-educated older white women. Indeed, that's what we see in congregations. "Free range" UUs are probably middle class, but are pretty likely to be lower middle class, if not poor; they're much less educated (perhaps struggling still to get educations?), they're young, and male. Simply taking US demographics--young, male, lower education and income... they're also far, far more likely to be mixed race or people of color.
