shepherdless

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Posts by shepherdless

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  23

  Aust 2016 Census observations: JW's getting older, more kids leaving, and 30+ group aren't returning

  by shepherdless in

  1. watchtower
  2. scandals

  1. median age.

  experts will tell you that if you want to know if a population is in growth or decline, the best single number to look at is the median age of the population.

  i have extracted aust census data and calculated the following approx median ages:.

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  shepherdless

  Thanks. I will try to extract some more interesting data over the next few days.
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  25

  Aust Census Data shows decrease while Yearbook shows increase

  by shepherdless in

  1. watchtower
  2. scandals

  on threads about 8 or 9 months ago, i put up some detailed data from the 2011 and 2006 australian censuses.

  data from the 2016 census is becoming available in stages, and i mentioned recently that i would do an update.

  finally, as of about today, some data of interest is available, and i have started to look at this, but it is time consuming, and i am time-poor.. anyway, the first search i have conducted is just a simple breakdown of the number of people describing themselves as jw's.

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  shepherdless

  Yes, Island Man, that is probably the explanation in a nutshell. More PIMO's and less POMI's in recent times.

  jwfacts: you are more than welcome to use any data I have. I can send it to you in excel format if it helps.
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  23

  Aust 2016 Census observations: JW's getting older, more kids leaving, and 30+ group aren't returning

  by shepherdless in

  1. watchtower
  2. scandals

  1. median age.

  experts will tell you that if you want to know if a population is in growth or decline, the best single number to look at is the median age of the population.

  i have extracted aust census data and calculated the following approx median ages:.

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  2. 
  3. 
• 

  shepherdless

  1. Median Age

  Experts will tell you that if you want to know if a population is in growth or decline, the best single number to look at is the median age of the population. I have extracted Aust census data and calculated the following approx median ages:

  Year 2006: Aust population: 37.0 JW's: 38.7

  Year 2011: Aust population: 37.6 JW's: 41.2

  Year 2016: Aust population: 38.1 JW's: 43.9

  For complicated reasons, I am not confident of the last decimal point, in the above. However, I am confident that the numbers broadly represent the situation.

  To put it in words, over 10 years, that median age of the Aust population rose slightly (1.1 years), but the JW median age went up substantially (5.2 years). A median of anything over around 40 would normally indicate decline, and the higher the number, the faster the decline.

  2. Age Cohort Detail

  Here is a breakdown of JW's from the last 3 censuses, into 5 year cohorts:

  
  

  Comparing 2011 to 2016, these number show that in every 5 year age category below 60, JW's have less adherents. Aust has a high immigration rate and the numbers look worse for the Borg if I extract out those from 2016 who were not in Aust in 2011. (It is not hard to do, but I suspect I will just confuse people with too many numbers if I set that out.)

  3. The "return to Jehovah"'s have stopped returning

  Another way to look at the data is to see what has happened to each cohort over 10 years. This involves reading the above chart diagonally, instead of straight down. Again, I haven't included the data for the sake of simplicity, but the increase in most cohorts between 2006 and 2011 is around the same number of JW's who in 2011 reported they were living outside of Aust in 2006 (ie, most of the increases were immigrants). The major exception is the significant increase in the 1 to 4 cohort.

  To explain, the above chart shows that in 2006, the number in the 1 to 4 cohort was 4058. in 2011, these kids were in the 5 to 9 bracket. Note there were now 4857 of them. That is 799 young kids drawn in by their parents. (Actually there were only 404 of them, because 295 of those kids were immigrants.)

  Maybe the Borg is having a lot of success recruiting young families. I think the more likely explanation is that a lot of the teens and young adults who left, started drifting back into the Borg when they settled down and started having kids themselves. This "return to Jehovah" group was probably the difference between expansion and decline in the past.

  This changed in 2016. Doing the same exercise comparing 2011 to 2016, the effect is still there, but it is very small. For the 0 to 4 bracket, there is only an increase of 217 kids, which is explainable by immigration.

  This is the reason I say in the title "the 30+ group aren't returning to Jehovah any more".

  4. It is not just the young ones who are leaving

  If you do the same exercise of following a cohort from 2011 to 2016 (ie reading the numbers diagonally, instead of straight down) you will note that they are actually losing numbers in every single age cohort. To put it another way, the reason the numbers for the 60+ groups are holding up is not because they are staying, it is because the younger ones are getting older and taking their places.
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  1

  Census & Publisher Trends for JWs in Australia, Canada & New Zealand: 1996-2016

  by steve2 in

  1. watchtower
  2. beliefs

  i have graphed jw census and average publisher data from 3 countries with similar western democratic governments: australia, canada and new zealand (nz).

  the census data is sourced from respective government publications and average publishers from jw organization yearbooks.. census data is incomplete either because a country did not have a census in the year under review or results from 2016 for that country are not currently available or i have not been able to source the data.

  i welcome others filling the gaps!.

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  shepherdless

  Thanks steve2. It looks like a universal trend, but more pronounced in Canada. As someone said on another thread, there must be an increase in PIMO's and/or a decrease in POMI's in renect times, for these figures to make sense.
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  25

  Aust Census Data shows decrease while Yearbook shows increase

  by shepherdless in

  1. watchtower
  2. scandals

  on threads about 8 or 9 months ago, i put up some detailed data from the 2011 and 2006 australian censuses.

  data from the 2016 census is becoming available in stages, and i mentioned recently that i would do an update.

  finally, as of about today, some data of interest is available, and i have started to look at this, but it is time consuming, and i am time-poor.. anyway, the first search i have conducted is just a simple breakdown of the number of people describing themselves as jw's.

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  shepherdless

  Thanks everyone for comments. I kept thinking I must have made a mistake extracting the data, because I was not expecting a fall at all, let alone 3.5%.

  What would be really fascinating would be an age profile of JWs from the latest data if possible. I predict that the average age of JWs is climbing rapidly.

  Yes I am keen to extract this as well. It might have to wait until tomorrow, though.

  steve2: Yes, I would expect whatever trends are occurring in Aust would be occurring in NZ as well, given the close cultural ties. Looking forward to seeing your data.

  I will be back with more data when I get the chance.
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  25

  Aust Census Data shows decrease while Yearbook shows increase

  by shepherdless in

  1. watchtower
  2. scandals

  on threads about 8 or 9 months ago, i put up some detailed data from the 2011 and 2006 australian censuses.

  data from the 2016 census is becoming available in stages, and i mentioned recently that i would do an update.

  finally, as of about today, some data of interest is available, and i have started to look at this, but it is time consuming, and i am time-poor.. anyway, the first search i have conducted is just a simple breakdown of the number of people describing themselves as jw's.

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  shepherdless

  Yes sbf, that explanation is broadly what I am thinking. I wasn't aware of the results of the Canadian census. I am still surprised, though.

  Joe: I'm surprised that there is only an imbalance of 11,000 between male and female JW's.

  It is around the same imbalance that came out of the 2011. There is no gender imbalance in the age groups below 20, so that 11,000 imbalance is worse than it initially looks.

  I will try to extract more interesting data over the next few days.
• 
  25

  Aust Census Data shows decrease while Yearbook shows increase

  by shepherdless in

  1. watchtower
  2. scandals

  on threads about 8 or 9 months ago, i put up some detailed data from the 2011 and 2006 australian censuses.

  data from the 2016 census is becoming available in stages, and i mentioned recently that i would do an update.

  finally, as of about today, some data of interest is available, and i have started to look at this, but it is time consuming, and i am time-poor.. anyway, the first search i have conducted is just a simple breakdown of the number of people describing themselves as jw's.

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• 

  shepherdless

  alanv: I dont believe the Australian service report is wrong.

  Personally, I don't think Watchtower is lying or making up figures. I suspect the av pubs numbers are just as reported to them. I suspect something else is going on.

  jwfacts: yes, given that Australia was one of the first places outside USA where Watchtower was established, it really has been a disappointing "Land" for Watchtower.
• 
  25

  Aust Census Data shows decrease while Yearbook shows increase

  by shepherdless in

  1. watchtower
  2. scandals

  on threads about 8 or 9 months ago, i put up some detailed data from the 2011 and 2006 australian censuses.

  data from the 2016 census is becoming available in stages, and i mentioned recently that i would do an update.

  finally, as of about today, some data of interest is available, and i have started to look at this, but it is time consuming, and i am time-poor.. anyway, the first search i have conducted is just a simple breakdown of the number of people describing themselves as jw's.

  1. 
  2. 
  3. 
• 

  shepherdless

  On threads about 8 or 9 months ago, I put up some detailed data from the 2011 and 2006 Australian censuses. Data from the 2016 census is becoming available in stages, and I mentioned recently that I would do an update. Finally, as of about today, some data of interest is available, and I have started to look at this, but it is time consuming, and I am time-poor.

  Anyway, the first search I have conducted is just a simple breakdown of the number of People describing themselves as JW's. Here are the results, for each of the last 3 censuses:

  Year 2006 (when Watchtower Yearbook reported 60,022 av pubs): 80,918

  Year 2011 (when Watchtower Yearbook reported 64,498 av pubs): 85,498

  Year 2016 (when Watchtower Yearbook reported 66,689 av pubs): 82,512

  Just to repeat what I said in an earlier post, e census numbers are always going to be larger than the Yearbook number, because the census numbers include kids in the same household. Eg, the 2011 census listed 5,162 JW's aged 10 to 14, 4,857 aged 5 to 9, and 4,538 aged 0 to 4.

  I couldn't initially believe the data for 2016, but I extracted it two separate ways, and repeated it for each census database in the same manner. I also extracted a breakdown by gender, which gave for the 2016 census: 35,913 male and 46,600 female (totalling 82,513).

  So from 2011 to 2016, when Aust population grew by about 7 or 8%, average publishers increased by 3.4%, the number of people who stated they were JW's on the census DECREASED by 3.5%.
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  37

  Watchtower teaches that Jesus dying on the stake is no longer certain

  by Listener in

  1. watchtower
  2. beliefs

  the watchtower has held for many years that jesus died on a stake and held strongly to this teaching.

  w 1951 3/15 the above agrees with the new world translation of the christian greek scriptures in its appendix, page 769, in saying that the instrument upon which jesus was nailed was a stake without a crossbeam, and not the religiously represented “cross”; and that the greek word used for that instrument in ancient time meant a “stake” and not the conventional religious cross.

  they are no longer certain on this point.

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  shepherdless

  It seems like they are laying the groundwork for a change.

  For a thorough discussion on whether the bible supports the "torture stake" dogma, the following link is excellent:

  https://www.jehovahs-witness.com/topic/92381/facts-on-crucifixion-stauros-torture-stake
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  7

  Reading technology as a driver of religious change among JWs

  by slimboyfat in

  1. watchtower
  2. beliefs

  i wonder if jws are currently undergoing a more significant transformation than generally appreciated.

  and i wonder if the drivers for that change are a combination of legal, economic, and technological factors.

  legal challenges changed jws stance of whether they are a "religion" with "ministers", in the 1950s, and stopped them charging for the literature in the 1990s.

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  shepherdless

  I agree it is a driver of significant change.

  My take on it is slightly different. Up until recently, Watchtower had an advantage over other fundamentalist Christians in that it had a highly successful business model based on its publishing business. Technology has destroyed that business, and now Watchtower now depends solely on donations from its own adherents.

  As a result, Watchtower is becoming just another fundamentalist religion, competing in a crowded field, where much of the competition have business models that still work (eg SDA with its food businesses and retirement homes, Catholics with their schools, hospitals, etc). Worse, Watchtower is at a disadvantage, because it is now managed by a committee of morons who can't make changes without a 2/3 majority, believe their own b.s., and seem to be just doubling down on what worked in the past.

  Will they become more accepting of outside literature? I can't see how they can survive as a high control group if they do. But not doing so also disadvantages them against the competition. It will be interesting to see how it plays out.