10 facts about religion and government in the United States
Here are key findings from our research on the relationship between religion and government in the U.S. and Americans’ views on the issue.
Numbers, Facts and Trends Shaping Your World
Here are key findings from our research on the relationship between religion and government in the U.S. and Americans’ views on the issue.
While there has been a decades-long decline in the Christian share of U.S. adults, 88% of the voting members in the new 118th Congress identify as Christian. That is only a few points lower than their share in the late 1970s.
82% of members of the historically Black Protestant tradition who attend church regularly have received at least one dose of a COVID-19 vaccine.
Although Catholicism has long been one of the largest U.S. religious groups, John F. Kennedy and Joe Biden are the only Catholic presidents.
Unified government at the beginning of a president’s first term has been the norm, especially for Democratic presidents.
Most Americans like labor unions, at least in the abstract. A majority (55%) holds a favorable view of unions, versus 33% who hold an unfavorable view, according to a Pew Research Center survey from earlier this year. Despite those fairly benign views, unionization rates in the United States have dwindled in recent decades. As of 2017, just 10.7% of all wage and salary workers were union members, matching the record low set in 2016, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics.
The vast majority of proposed amendments die quiet, little-mourned deaths in committees and subcommittees.
Congress passed 113 laws, 87 of them substantive, in 2015, making it the most productive first session since 2009.
Legislative productivity may be on an upswing, as lawmakers enacted more bills before their August break than either of the two preceding Congresses.
The American public’s generally favorable view of labor unions hasn’t stopped, or even slowed, union membership’s long decline.
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ABOUT PEW RESEARCH CENTER Pew Research Center is a nonpartisan fact tank that informs the public about the issues, attitudes and trends shaping the world. It conducts public opinion polling, demographic research, media content analysis and other empirical social science research. Pew Research Center does not take policy positions. It is a subsidiary of The Pew Charitable Trusts.
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