New Jewish Population Study

Rabbi Melanie Aron

October 18, 2002

Recently the preliminary results of the 2000-2001 National Jewish population study were released.

Just as the 1990 study caused quite a stir with its findings about the prevalence of intermarriage, this newer study is also controversial. Its major conclusions are:

1) That the Jewish population of the United States, about 5.2 million, has declined 5% in the past decade making us roughly 2% and not 3% of the U.S. population.

2) That Jews are aging and that the Jewish birth rate (1.8) is below replacement level (2.1).

One further interesting but yet to be explored finding is that along with the 5.2 million Jews living in 2.9 million Jewish households, there are also 1.5 million individuals living in Jewish households who do not identify themselves as Jews. Exactly how strong these people's ties to the Jewish community are, is a matter of debate.

Other information from the study was less surprising. The distribution of Jews Northeast, South and West has not changed dramatically since the 1990 study. Jewish rates of divorce, about 9% of Jewish adults have been divorced, parallel rates for the general population. About 19% of Jews are defined as low income with the median Jewish income being $50,000 a year, slightly higher than the US median income of $42,000 a year.

One local demographer, Gary Tobin, of the San Francisco based Institute for Jewish Community Research claims that the way the national survey was done led to an artificially low count of Jewish population. He argues that people are disinclined to tell a stranger on the telephone that they are Jewish, particularly at the very beginning of an interview. He notes: "When receiving a random phone call from a nosey stranger wanting to know if their parents were Jewish or not, many will simply hang up the phone."

Using a different set of questions, asking about Jewishness further into the interview when rapport is better established, he found 6.7 million Jews and 2.5 million Americans connected to Jews, and a further 4.1 million Americans with some Jewish ancestry, such as a Jewish grandparent. In his count of Jews, Tobin included the children of mixed marriages, even if a second religion was being practiced in the home. He did not include Jews for Jesus. He further notes that many American Jews consider themselves Jewish in ethnic and cultural terms rather than in religious ones, complicating the data collection.

Population studies are interesting for more than numbers. Questions are asked about behavior and culture, about whether a person reads a Jewish newspaper or keeps up with news about Israel. Also about whether someone lights Hanukah candles or doesn't use money on Shabbat. Other questions covered included upbringing, education, camp and college Jewish experiences, social networks, volunteerism and philanthropic activity. As more information is released, we have the potential to understand more about what Jewish identity means to American Jews and to expand our knowledge about what Jews do rather than what we think Jews should do. Especially at issue in this study is the question of Jewish cultural alternatives to religion for the many Jews who consider themselves secular.

Finally, there has also been interesting information released from a major study comparing the Jews of the Bay Area with Jewish communities around the country.

As compared to other Jewish communities in the east and in the south, Jews in the Bay Area are more likely to donate to non-Jewish charities, and less likely to donate to Jewish charities and Federation. Bay area Jews perceive less anti-Semitism in their local community and also have less personal experience of anti-Semitism. In terms of traveling to Israel, Bay area Jews fall in the middle as they travel more than Jews from some cities, but are less likely to travel to Israel. Jews in the Bay area are less likely to say that all their closest friends are Jewish, and are less likely to belong to Jewish organizations or a synagogue. Jews in the Bay Area are less ritually observant, less likely to regularly light the Shabbat or Hanukah candles or attend Passover Seder. With the relatively large percentage of immigrants from the FSU locally, we currently have a lower % professionals and a higher % of Jews born outside the US than the typical American city.

The differences between the Bay Area and other Jewish communities create special challenges for synagogues, challenges that we have discussed at Shir Hadash and which we continue to address in a a variety of ways.