Mapping Income Distribution by Religious Belief
awesome.good.is
awesome.good.is
And a breakdown of the unaffiliated grouping: (The sample size is said to be 35,000) Atheist: 100k+: 28% 50-100k: 31% 30-50k: 20% <30k: 21%
Agnostic: (whatever the difference in reporting means) 100k+: 25% 50-100k: 35% 30-50k: 22% <30k: 18%
I think in this example, religions affiliation is mostly an indicator of social and economic class, educational trends and the economic reality of immigration opportunities (like in the case of most Hindus) rather than the prevalence of certain religions to earn more. It's also interesting to note that the makers of the graph choose to include such small groups such as Hindu and Buddhist (At .4% and .7% of the population) and attribute the atheist and agnostic population to 1.6% and 2.4%
Further differences in these statistics are the age breakdowns of the different groups and the cultural and social trends that influence the senior members to remain working a longer time. There are differences between religious belief between age groups, and differences in income as well (generally getting higher with age).
The study goes into detail, comparing the educational levels of the different religious groups. Compared to the national average of 11% with post-grad degrees, Jewish and Hindu practitioners are at 35 and a staggering 48%. Atheists and agnostics are a about tied for fourth at 20%, after Buddhists at 26%. Gender seems to play an issue as well, for example atheists are more than twice as likely to be men.
Agnostic: Does not follow any particular religion, does believe in god or gods.
"Agnostic" means either "doesn't claim to know whether a god or gods exist" or "claims that whether a god or gods exist is unknowable". Or, occasionally and when it's clear from context, "doesn't claim to know whether some particular other thing is true or not". ("I'm agnostic about whether there will be human-level AI within fifty years", for instance.)
Someone who believes in a god or gods is not agnostic in any usual sense. (They might be agnostic on particular questions: "I believe there's some sort of god, but I'm agnostic as to whether it's the one believed in by Christians" or whatever.)
Theists are of the opinion that the probability that god exists is likely, in say 50-100%
Agnostics are of the opinion that the probability that god exists is uncertain, in say 33-66%
Atheists are of the opinion that the probability that god exists is unlikely, in say 0-50%
One gotcha is that, if you account for the greater number of theists, the distribution is not symmetric. Atheists tend to be less certain (more agnostic) than theists.
I would hope the same is true or the atheist/agnostic.
Edit: I was considering the Christian theist.
Theism is belief in god. Atheism is lack thereof. Agnostics claim that gods' existence is unknowable.
To co-opt Gervais' skiing simile: we have people who go skiing, those who do not, and then people who maintain it's impossible to know whether skiing actually occurs.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atheism#Definitions_and_distinc...
Looks like my understanding was of "Strong Atheism", while the one Gervais describes would be "Weak Atheism".
I think the "not skiing"-style example is very illustrative of the actual mental model atheists have, and importantly works relatively well in most languages to explain the concept of lack of belief which the "opponent" — someone espousing a belief — has a hard time understanding.
So most atheists don't really insist that a god cannot possibly exist, merely that one doesn't according to available evidence, and as such can and should be ignored. Exactly in the same way I do not take into account leprechauns when making decisions, they are a non-factor.
Edit: mind, I do agree there are some quite argumentative and belligerent atheists.
I would call myself an agnostic atheist. I don't believe in gods, but I have to admit there's no way to prove they don't exist.
I've met people who consider themselves agnostic theists--they think a god probably exists but they admit they cannot prove it.
In the face of confidently presented misinformation, I think it's reasonable to begin with something that indicates that I'm offering a correction and not merely a disagreement. Even if that comes across as less than perfectly polite: correcting someone isn't a perfectly polite thing to do.
(Of course, it really is rude to present something as a correction rather than a disagreement if you're not actually right. So I wouldn't do it if I weren't very confident that GrandMasterBirt is all wrong about what "agnostic" means. And I'll look very silly if it turns out that I'm the one who's wrong. But I am, and he is, and I'm not.)
In Comments
When disagreeing, please reply to the argument instead of calling names. E.g. "That is an idiotic thing to say; 1 + 1 is 2, not 3" can be shortened to "1 + 1 is 2, not 3."
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"Uh, no." IMHO carries a different connotation than, for example, "Actually." I think the former is very much like "That's idiotic" and the latter comes off as more polite.
It might be because I hung out with too many Liberal Arts students (who subsist on Pabst Blue Ribbon and sarcasm), but when I read "Uh, no." I hear it in the condescending tone that announces "You are so lamentably incorrect that I have to say 'Uhhhh...' just to give myself time to process how wrong you are."
I suppose I am defeating my own point, because you can also say "Actually" in the exact same tone. But, I feel like it's almost impossible to say "Uh, no." without the corresponding condescension. The "Uh" is very powerful; moreso in text! Because it means not only did you have that moment of cognitive dissonance--the "Uhh" moment in which you process the depth of their wrongness--but that you are also announcing that dissonance to your conversational partner. That, I think, is where the perceived rudeness comes in.
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Also, I understand what you mean about degrees of certainty, but it's important to remember that you could still be wrong no matter how certain you are. That doesn't mean you should eschew presenting or advertising your well-researched beliefs; just that there are ways to communicate them without presenting them as the certainties you (perhaps wrongfully) assume they are.
Interestingly, they aren't mutually exclusive categories. One can easily believe something without claiming to know it, so one can be an agnostic theist, but one can also be an agnostic atheist.
By sheer definition, "agnostic" doesn't really mean anything. But in a social context, it's generally a term used by weak atheists to emphasize they are open minded people who aren't coming to a firm decision either way without evidence.
Here there comes a practical question which has often troubled me. Whenever I go into a foreign country or a prison or any similar place they always ask me what is my religion.
I never know whether I should say "Agnostic" or whether I should say "Atheist". It is a very difficult question and I daresay that some of you have been troubled by it. As a philosopher, if I were speaking to a purely philosophic audience I should say that I ought to describe myself as an Agnostic, because I do not think that there is a conclusive argument by which one prove that there is not a God.
On the other hand, if I am to convey the right impression to the ordinary man in the street I think I ought to say that I am an Atheist, because when I say that I cannot prove that there is not a God, I ought to add equally that I cannot prove that there are not the Homeric gods.
None of us would seriously consider the possibility that all the gods of homer really exist, and yet if you were to set to work to give a logical demonstration that Zeus, Hera, Poseidon, and the rest of them did not exist you would find it an awful job. You could not get such proof.
Therefore, in regard to the Olympic gods, speaking to a purely philosophical audience, I would say that I am an Agnostic. But speaking popularly, I think that all of us would say in regard to those gods that we were Atheists. In regard to the Christian God, I should, I think, take exactly the same line.
Yeah, but why does it matter when they come to the US? Shouldn't hindus who immigrated earlier have an upper hand, both in income and education, regardless of social status of new immigrants? Maybe it's because immigration from India to the US is somewhat recent phenomena?
Technically, when talking about language, throw all your rules and logic out the window. :)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linguistic_prescription
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Descriptive_linguistics
It's great fun to find out when someone is inclined in one of those directions, because they go out of their way to justify their perspective. It's better than C++ vs. Java.
Look at the average graph, only 18% of the population make more than $100K. How many people in IT make less? I don't know too many, apart from really junior developers.
I'm sure if you plot Chinese vs Russian vs Indian immigrants, the numbers would be pretty close.
For example the Japanese community in the UK is tiny, almost all are senior execs of Japanese merchant banks or electronics companies - so average income is probably $250k. But in San Fransisco there are lots of poor 3-4 generation Japanese kids. It doesn't mean that there is anything better about the UK for Japanese immigrants
Most of India doesn't care about caste; it's time that people _outside_ India stopped caring about Indians' caste too.
Family-based immigration is comparatively rare.
It remains to be seen (and could be a topic of further study) how well their descendants do. There is indeed a lot of pressure to do well in academics in Indian families (anyone who's watched the Spelling Bee competitions can see the disproportionate representation of kids of Indian descent), so it is possible that the subsequent generations will continue to do well; but it would still be worth studying.
edit: before I get people bitching at me http://www.halfsigma.com/2006/06/high_iq_does_no.html
this is a great link since we had this argument here before with about half HNers thinking that income somehow correlates to IQ.
however this link doesn't explain why you think jews (as practitioners of judaism, not as a nationality) have higher IQs?
You could similarly link the Hindu religion to dark hair, or other genetic traits common among ethnic groups who have a high percentage of Hindu practitioners. It wouldn't be true all the time, but it would probably show a significant correlation.
If you look at the data included with the GRE CD, you can see the same trend: those who perform spectacularly on the verbal portion are philosophy majors and the like. How much would you expect their average salary to be? No doubt it's significantly less than for most engineers, who don't verbally perform as well, but hit close to the (low) ceiling of the math portion. Income vs. verbal IQ within the same education class is probably all over the map because of this, and no doubt significantly confounded wrt cause-and-effect.
On the other hand, I would expect there to be a strong benefit to verbal intelligence within each profession.
TLDR: The link hardly proves that a higher IQ does not cause higher income.
But maybe I'm asking too much.
I'm not sure about this. Most ex-Soviet Jews went to Israel, I believe. I think the vast majority of Jews in America have west-European roots.
The truth is the Orthodox Jewish community pushes education a very much. In the Modern Orthodox community this translates into both Academic and Torah learning. While in the Ultra Orthodox communities, this often times (not always) translates into learning Torah for most if not all of the day.
It is also very expensive to live an Orthodox Jewish life. Kosher food is more expensive, living in an Orthodox community is more expensive, and Jewish private school tuition is a minimum of $19,000 a year per kid for high school. It is pretty much a prerequesite to make over a hundred thousand in order to live in the Orthodox community.
Then leave out the less succesfull ones who don't identify themselves as part of that group.
So it wasn't simply that they had to compensate in other areas as a result of not being allowed to own land, but that they had rights that others didn't.
The Jews have almost always had extraordinary pressures, e.g., killed outright (e.g., Nazi Germany), restricted from owning land (e.g., Venice, Spain). Among their responses to the first was to migrate and, to the second, to move into commerce, moneylending, finance, etc.
If your group is dealing with pressures that another population is not exposed to, then your group's survivors will better deal with that pressure. If, at the same time, that pressure becomes more widespread in a society, then your group also benefits from that. That is, the Jews were involved in commerce and market economies earlier than other groups on average.
Of course this isn't everything. Consider the European gypsies. Certainly they suffered many, if not most, of the same pressures as the Jews, but their current situation is comparatively grim.
I think the more likely explanation is cultural. Yes, Jews were forced into certain professions, but they have also historically emphasized (religious) education. As Jews in the Western world became more assimilated, the emphasis on religion decreased, but the emphasis on education did not. This familial emphasis on education is still felt today and has manifested itself as a propensity for Jews to enter highly skilled professions, such as law and medicine.
Not true.
2. The Jews _were_ under extreme pressure: people apparently felt free to kill them, persecute them, rape them, wipe them out. What could be more extreme?
3. Yes, culture would help. But it would also speed genetic change as Jews increasingly moved into an ecological niche defined by a particular set of abilities (e.g., counting, visualization, quantification, pattern recognition, concept formation) used in fields such as finance.
The only acceptable professions to Jewish mothers are doctor, lawyer and maybe investment banker. On top of that, there are extreme social pressures to succeed. Add a tight knit community and blamo, generations of high paid Jews.
Seriously, culture has a far greater impact on success than intelligence.
The more people in the group in the US, the more likely that that group is representative of the entire group around the world. (Hand waving: the null hypothesis is that there are actually no differences between the religious groups. So, the more people you include in each group, the closer you will get to the overall average.) When you have lots of people in each group, relative to the total population, but still see differences, then that is interesting.
This fits with what you are trying to exclude, because your immigrants are likely a small percentage of their respective religious groups, so we can be uncertain about the conclusions we draw from a small sample.
It's like claiming that flying first class makes people hungry for success - because everybody that arrives by first class is rich
It is "Jehovah's Witnesses" not "Jehovah Witnesses" or "Jehovahs". The apostrophe followed by an "s" is meaningful because it shows that these Witnesses belong to Jehovah. This idea is taken from the passage at Isaiah 43:10 which says:
"YOU are my witnesses", is the utterance of Jehovah, "even my servant whom I have chosen, in order that YOU may know and have faith in me".
One of the core beliefs of Jehovah's Witnesses is that just as you and I have names, God has a name as well and it is important to use that name in worship and prayer.
Therefore we find it mildly offensive to be called "Jehovahs" as that is like saying we are gods, and "Jehovah Witnesses" makes the name of God sound like an adjective.
We prefer to be called by our name "Jehovah's Witnesses" or as a shortened form just "Witnesses".
I assume your smile was humor about the fact that members of the Jehovah's Witnesses have on average a lower income than members of many other religions. I could comment on possible explanations for why, but this comment is already getting long.
First of all, we do our evangelical work everywhere, to both rich and poor individuals, but in general people who are poor or immigrants or minorities are more interested in religion when compared to someone who has a high paying job and feels they are already very satisfied with their life.
Second of all, Jehovah's Witnesses advocate a simple life. The idea is that it doesn't take a lot of money to live a nice life, its how you use that money. For example, a baptized Witness is not be a smoker, gambler, alcoholic, etc. By quitting the smoking or drug habit many individuals have lowered their expenses, allowing them to live better lives without raising their income.
To some extent the pursuit of high education is not encouraged. Although many Witnesses will get an Associates Degree, it is generally not encouraged that they go on to higher education. This does also limit income.
But to go along with your comment, yes I feel happy and fulfilled. I spend roughly half my time at the computer doing freelance web development work or working on my startup Bookflavor. The rest of the time I spend with friends or doing door to door preaching. It is actually very interesting.
Imagine going door to door one weekend in an affluent neighborhood where a security guard takes down your license plate before allowing you to enter, then the next week going door to door in the ghetto where you have to watch where you step to avoid trash and used condoms. Jehovah's Witnesses get to talk to people of all sorts. As someone who is deeply interested in psychology and sociology I enjoy this communication with people from different cultural and economic backgrounds. Our door to door work is fascinating not only from that perspective, but also from the perspective of practicing real world sales skills. I would dare say any decent Jehovah's Witnesses would make a great salesman/woman.
I would say that my life is very interesting, and I wouldn't be any happier if I worked more hours so that I could make more money. Indeed if I worked more hours to make more money I wouldn't have time to work on my startup.
I want to ask you a question, why do you feel the need to go into someone's house with the goal of converting them to your religion? I've had discussions about religion with a few Jehovah's Witnesses that have come around my home, and they've been resentful and insulting when having to deal with a two sided conversation about their religion and my lack thereof. I'm of course not saying you're the same, but from my experience, most Jehovah's Witnesses seem either fanatics or 'salespeople' (people with the need to make me buy into something they want me to).
I have a problem with being disrupted in my home after a long day by someone trying to convert me into a religion I don't follow, but even then I try to be respectful and understand that people have different believes to mine. I'd expect the same treatment from a person ringing my doorbell to preach, but I have found that it very rarely is the case.
To make this easier to understand you could easily substitute other goals. For example, what if you knew of a treatment for diabetes or AIDS that could benefit others? Wouldn't you feel the need to tell others with diabetes and AIDS rather than leaving them to stumble across it on their own?
Likewise, we feel that the morals and lifestyle we advocate are beneficial and can help many improve their lives. Therefore we want to tell other people about it. At that point other people can either say "I don't like it and don't want to hear about it," or "I like it and want to find out more."
I'm sorry you have had some bad experiences with Witnesses visiting your door in the past. Naturally there are unbalanced and insulting Jehovah's Witnesses just as there are unbalanced and insulting atheists. People differ. However, I can assure you that every Jehovah's Witness is encouraged to be very respectful and polite about sharing his/her beliefs and listening to the beliefs of others. Some people's personality traits aren't up to par, but we can't stop them from going out and talking to others. Remember that every Jehovah's Witness is a volunteer so naturally some of these volunteers are going to be good, and some of them aren't going to be so good.
If you experience someone who seems rude or confrontational you can tell them to leave your door, or you could get their name and complain to the local congregation (using the phone number in the local phone book). Somebody will probably talk to them and ask them to please be more polite.
At any rate if you would like to try a decent, two sided conversation about religion or the beliefs of Jehovah's Witnesses feel free to contact me:
My issue is that more times than not, my answer tends to be followed by a list of why I'm wrong and why I should convert. If I expressed that I'm not interested in the discussion at that time, I'm bombarded with reproach. If it happens that I'm in for some friendly debate, it becomes an issue of being told that I'm wrong because god said so... followed by more intense reproach, of course in a not so friendly way.
I'm generally not a fan of discussing religion because there are no clear cut winners and it generally becomes an issue of the more eloquent party having the upper hand. More times than not someone ends up with angry-ish feelings towards the opposing party. In any case, you're probably a diamond in a sea of carbon... You guys should make door to door preaching something a member can do after being vetted as capable of not offending the population you're trying to convert.
Perhaps if you were willing to talk about your beliefs I might go on to other questions such as "Do you believe that it is possible for us to determine if a God exists?" or "Do you think it is possible to find evidence that God exists?" and "Would you be willing to listen to some reasons why I feel that there is a God?"
If so we could discuss each individual reason. Really it is comparable to having a discussion here on Hacker News. There are disagreements here on HN but as long as everyone sticks to the guidelines everyone involved can have a productive conversation. I feel that likewise it is possible to have a productive conversation about religion.
Jehovah's Witnesses do have a vetting approach of sorts when it comes to determining capability but as I'm sure you will agree vetting is an extremely hard problem to tackle both accurately and fairly.
Universal evangelism in JW congregations will never disappear. The shared experience helps separate them from the rest of the world and bind them together, much like hazing at a fraternity or combat experiences in the military.
As an unbeliever growing up in a JW household, going door to door every weekend was certainly one of the most horrific parts of my early life. I am so, so glad that is over.
When I was around, they did't have the wealth or intellectual sophistication to advertise themselves effectively. We had been using the same sales book for years and I wouldn't be surprised if "the reasoning book" is still around. An organization that enforces orthodoxy as thoroughly as Jehovah's Witnesses isn't exactly a breeding ground for creative and entrepreneurial spirits.
I wouldn't expect them to pivot if hard sales techniques proved to be annoying or ineffective. They used to publish their conversion statistics in the January 1st or 15th edition of The Watchtower so you could follow their growth (an anemic 1% or so per year back in the late 90s). That was a shockingly transparent move for such a close-minded organization; it probably helps increase members trust in the central organization. But it is also bad for morale to watch numbers languish.
JWs believe that all other religions are tools of the devil designed to distract people from the one true religion - theirs. This is true of "false Christianity", other Christian religions, as well as "pagan" religions. Being a good JW is the only sure way of staying on the right side of the JW version of the blessed and the damned; belong to any other religion and your chances aren't so good (though God may give some people a second chance after he destroys our world as it exists today).
On a more practical level, there is immense peer pressure within the church to go door-to-door. Hours spent evangelizing are reported to the local elders by each member of the church and detailed records of evangelism activity are kept. Families and individuals that don't spend sufficient time evangelizing are pressured by the church elders to do more.
My experience is mostly with people who had the misfortune to be born into the church who live repressed and desperate lives. On the other hand, most converts come from the rank of the poor and destitute and probably see their lives improve upon joining the church due to the strict lifestyle and strong community.
The poverty of Jehovah's Witnesses is mostly due to the forced ignorance of their young, since there are so few converts (at least, US growth numbers were poor in the late 90s/early 00s, probably below member fertility).
I think you deserve some explanation from my side. I don't know what it is about in USA, but here, in Russia, "Jehovah's Witnesses" is just a pyramidal sect. They spam, they visit other people's homes, they annoy you on the streets, and once someone gets to become a Jehovah's Witness, you won't see him again.
That's also a reason why I wasn't really surprised by low levels of their incomes. Mostly because after you drop your job, you don't usually earn much.
Jehovah's Witnesses definitely do visit people's homes here in the U.S, and some people are certainly annoyed by that, but one possibly little known fact is that if you tell a Witness that you don't ever want them to come back we'll add you to a "Do Not Call List". If you are really irritated by our visits you can easily stop them.
I certainly don't feel that we are a "pyramidal sect". We are a sect in the definition that our beliefs differ from those of the dominant world religions, but that isn't necessarily a bad thing. Pyramidal would imply that some members are better than others or that we have some complex structure that oppresses the common member in favor of an elite class of members. On the contrary I can assure you that every member is treated equally. Naturally some members who are better at coordinating things take the lead in organizing functions and operations but these individuals are not assumed to be better than any other member, and there are no extra perks, pay, or glory going to these volunteers.
I'm not sure why you would not be seeing someone after they became a Jehovah's Witness. I know that the Russian government has put major pressure on JW's in violation of their own laws on freedom of religion and as a result local JW's may find it beneficial to maintain a low profile. Another possible explanation is that after becoming JW's many choose to stop associating with former friends who they find to be living lifestyles which are immoral and who they feel might be a bad influence.
As for "dropping your job" the only case where I can think of a Jehovah's Witness leaving their employment because they were a Witness would be a situation in which the person was working in the army, or in some industry directly connected to immoral activity.
At any rate I'm sorry that you see the ministry work being done in Russia as "spam", and "annoying". We just want to give you free reading material that you can consider and compare with your own beliefs. If you don't like it, tell us and we'll leave you alone. If you do like it, tell us and we'll be happy to explain more to you.
In my mind there are tremendous advantages to being well informed and learning about alternative cultures, so I am willing to consider ideas and reading material from numerous sources. In the end, I am the one who makes the decision about how to live my life. Jehovah's Witnesses feel that we have a very beneficial way of life that others can benefit from, so we advocate it. Why not have a serious talk with a Jehovah's Witness?
In the worst case scenario we are just crazy people and you wasted your time talking to us. However, you still gained valuable information and a broader picture of the different cultures of the world. In the best case scenario you find our way of life interesting and decide to pursue it.
Despite calls for reform, college attendance for youngsters is still actively discouraged in favor of trade school and worse options (such as homeschooling). All in the name of being able to dedicate greater time evangelizing. All of us that have left know that the underlying rationale is to prevent young JWs from being exposed to rational, liberal thought that almost inevitably destroys their house of cards dogma.
Yes I'm smiling too. The moral upbringing was good. The emotional baggage is not.
In my time going to college I have not felt that "rational, liberal thought" is in contrast to any perceived "dogma" that I have been taught as one of Jehovah's Witnesses.
Also remember that the chart statistics only use income as a measure of comparison. This is fairly meaningless because lower income does not necessarily mean a worse living condition or less happiness.
I left at 18 when I discovered that evolution wasn't the nonsense I'd always been taught. There was a period where I searched desperately for any credible arguments against it, and found none. When I started talking to the people who had been telling me it was wrong, I realized that they had no idea what evolution actually was. In some cases, they didn't know the distinction between natural selection and the theories of the origin of the universe.
People accuse the JW's of being a cult with good reason: members are discouraged from associating with non-members. They're also told to avoid all contact with anyone who is 'disfellowshipped' (thrown out).
This means that the penalty for disagreement with the church is losing everyone you care about. 'Shunning' is a tactic very common to cults.
This also means the price for being intellectually honest with yourself is very high. That's how smart people manage to continue believing in something so demonstrably false. For me to give up my faith, strong evidence wasn't enough - it took overwhelming evidence, and even then it was a very emotionally trying time.
The reason their income is low is simple: the church has noticed that education is anti-correlated with membership and so they continually discourage it. Very much like a corrupt government tries to bury information injurious to itself.
I agree, only comparing income is rather misleading.
JW's don't smoke or do drugs and so have a far smaller problem with addictions which require professional help and counseling. So although on paper the JWs and the Black Protestant Churches look similar in terms of income one has to remember that the Black Churches have a significant problem with addiction to drugs and alcohol among their members which contributes to their low income scores.
Not smoking or doing drugs frees up more of the JWs disposable income, and the same goes for Mormons not drinking alcohol.
Also many JWs have a lower income because many of them only work part-time by choice so that they have more spare time for preaching, a by-product of this is that voluntarily being able to spend less time at work generally means less stress in the family and more time with the children.
Then again, rich man, heaven, all that jazz. We'll see who has the last laugh. Or we won't. Let's eat.
P.S. Ex-JW party on Hacker News! The shunning was hard at first, but it feels so good to be out.