Statistics - Spreadsheets - Opinion

by berrygerry 20 Replies latest watchtower beliefs

• 

  berrygerry

  So, spent a fair bit of time on the stats.

  The 2010-2015 numbers are available here: https://drive.google.com/folderview?id=0BwV5UvzB3-67aXpzaVk0M0NTTFE&usp=sharing

  Also there are spreadsheets of: ratios, peak-pubs, and the best is a combo of ratios, peak pubs & average pubs.

  You can play with these by "Select All" and "Sort" according to your preference.

  If you would like any other combination, I would try to create it and post it for you.

  OF INTEREST:

  As has been noted, the biggest standout of 2015 is the increase of only 18k in Peak Pubs while having 260k baptized. Makes little sense.

  Most of the Peak Pub growth is Africa. Nine countries (Togo, Rwanda, South Africa, Madagascar, Cameroon, Zimbabwe, Nigeria, Angola, Ghana) have a total increase of 28,954 Peak Pubs.

  The African countries not pulling their weight are: Congo, and the glowing poster child, Malawi.

  India had an impressive increase - strange that WTS is abandoning this potential.

  Besides the nine African countries and India, there were two winners for WTS, Mexico and, showing an impressive rebound, Brazil

  Eastern Europe shows across the board declines. Russia's surprising growth does not offset the declines in Ukraine, if indeed Ukrainian Dubs have escaped to Russia.

  Central and South America are flat as a pancake. (Excepting Brazil)
  

  Notable losers are:

  Poland, Puerto Rico, Korea, Jamaica, Chile, Congo.

  Many, many countries show declines in both the ratio to population and Peak Pubs, but an increase in Avg Pubs. (See Summary below) Unless otherwise noted, this applies to North and South America, and both Eastern and Western Europe. Notable countries such as D.R., Australia, Canada, Zambia, Spain, and Britain fall into this category.

  The top 17 countries had a total increase of 59,018 Peak Pubs, even though the global increase was only 18,560. They have acknowledged declines in Peak Pubs in 91 countries.

  SUMMARY

  There are declines across the board in almost all metrics.

  Included in these declines is the decline in Aux Pio. They must have realized this during early 2015, and hence the strong-arming for the push in August. Even with that push, there was a striking decrease from 635k to 443k - a decrease of 191,794. The increase of 45,764 Reg. Pio. does not justify this decrease.

  The desperation in the push for money shows that they have run out of ideas. Their abandonment of India seems to reinforce this view.

  Also, many, many countries are showing declines in both the Ratio-to-Pop and Peak Pubs, but are then showing an INCREASE in Avg Pubs. This makes no sense whatsoever, and makes it possible that they have created a new measure as to what composes the Average Publishers statistic. (The previous was already as vague as could be [Aug 15, 2011 QFR]: . “"Average publishers” is the typical number of different ones reporting time in the ministry each month." Who defines "typical"?)
  
  

  IF (it remains to be seen how big of an IF it is) 2016 follows suit to 2015, then 2014 would have been the peak of WTS. (fingers crossed).
  
• 

  dropoffyourkeylee

  It's the worst report in many many years.

  I still think there is an oddity with the peak numbers this time, causing it to be abnormally low. The ratio of peak to average publishers is lower this year than for 20 years or more.
• 

  Oubliette

  the biggest standout of 2015 is the increase of only 18k in Peak Pubs while having 260k baptized.

  So that means that (not counting for deaths) 242k JWs have left the religion!

  That's fantastic news!!!
  
• 

  JW GoneBad

  I found this article from earlier this year (around April) on jw.org entitled 'More Than 165,000 Literature Carts':

  "Jehovah’s Witnesses, well-known for their house-to-house preaching, are now found standing beside attractive literature display carts in public places.

  Recently, this form of preaching has been given more emphasis. In November 2011, a group of Witnesses in New York City began to acquaint people with the Bible’s message by means of literature display tables and carts. This endeavor was so successful that it quickly spread to other cities.

  As of March 2015, 165,390 carts have been supplied to congregations of Jehovah’s Witnesses throughout the world. Thousands of stands, tables, and kiosks have also been acquired.

  The house-to-house activity is still the primary way in which the Witnesses make known Bible truth. Yet, literature carts have proved to be very effective."

  'Yet literature carts have proved to very effective'. Very effective...my ass!

  I'm happy to see that WT's high hopes for the hundreds of thousands of trolley carts and the thousands of stands, tables, and kiosks strategically stationed and maned by their elite auxiliary and regular pioneers worldwide hasn't done them a damn bit of good in getting their preaching productivity and numbers up.

  Thank you berrygerry for the stats breakdown!
• 

  ILoveTTATT2

  Brazil has had a shitty 2014 and 2015 in many ways. I am not surprised that people are much easier to hold captive in the cult.
• 

  berrygerry

  'Yet literature carts have proved to very effective'. Very effective...my ass!

  When you look at the stats - none of the Peak Pub growth is in Cult Cart areas.
  

  
• 

  nelim

  My guess is that there still is a "rebound" and a decline going on at the same time. The rebound is inactive or partially active JWs becoming (more) regularly active (fear due to ISIS, the Syria war, the big stream of refugees etc.). This rebound has been going on for a couple of years now since the economic depression (taken from jwfacts.com statistics page). This is why the average publishers is going up.
  

  At the same time many JWs are fading/leaving, and there are so many that even though new people are coming in, just as many are exiting at the moment. This is why the peak is only such a little bit higher.

  If this is true, then next year I expect also a standstill in average publishers growth, and after this a decline setting in. I hope things will settle a bit in the Middle East, and the economy will continue to pick up. So far not really convincing, people in general are still a negative about the future and therefore not spending much; delaying an economic boost.

  I also noticed this year there still has been in increase in both spending and Bethelites. Spending increased about 5% ($224M to $236M). Evidently (pun intended!) the GB was still quite hopeful in their May broadcast, or they can't change direction as fast as they like. In that case this end year's news about the cuts should show next year. 2016 is going to be interesting year!
  
• 

  konceptual99

  I think you need to look at the last 5 years in terms of comparisons. Last year featured special campaigns and the 2014 100 years of the kingdom birthday celebration. My feeling on the data I've looked at is that last year was a spike and the trend is more discernible from a longer period.

  That said, I think the ratios and growth figures for this year show a number of interesting points as brought out in the OP.
• 

  besty

  Hey Lurking Bethel Heavies - yes you!

  My advice for 2016 is to continue battering the flock as this will improve morale. Hopefully all those lying apostates will quieten down about the ch*ld ab*se and money will continue flowing in.

  Listen - if things get really bad you can always go with an actual end times date, you know- like an end times cult really outta have one.

  Good luck and see you in 2017!

  P
• 

  freddo

  In my micro-climate 40% of the congregation's do less than 5 hours per month immune to any "encouragement" or "guilt trips". I hear that about 10% of are persistently "irregular". About 10% of the publishers "listen in on the phone" and do about an hour or less - put in by the secretary.

  We have about five ex elders sat in the audience and I guess half of those are in the 5 hour/ low answering group. The older zealous "1975" generation elders are dying or limited by age.

  In the past three years we have had two older ones go inactive, one older one disassociate (apostasy) and five teenagers "not progress to baptism" and leave or become memorial attenders only. I only recall one teenager baptised.

  The "zealous pioneer ones" and the "important elders wives" spend a huge mount of time on a nearby city's trolley carts wasting their efforts. This leaves the 40% to do the door to door work which also produces zero.

  The only new people we see are weirdos who don't work or who don't wash and the occasional semi-apostate who turns up for a public talk every two months and disappears!

  Oh and loads of depression and meds among all age groups. Jehovah's happy people don'cha know!