Numbers, Facts and Trends Shaping Your World
Senior research staff answer questions from readers relating to all the areas covered by our seven projects, ranging from polling techniques and findings, to media, technology, religious, demographic and global attitudes trends.
A 2010 Pew Research Center survey found that most Americans (62%) continue to express support for the death penalty for persons convicted of murder, while 30% oppose it. This is nearly identical to the level of support in 2007 but somewhat lower than earlier in the 2000s and especially the 1990s.
Today’s military is smaller, older, more diverse and more likely to be married than the force that served a generation or two ago. A larger proportion of minorities and women serve as officers and enlisted personnel. Proportionately fewer high school dropouts and more college graduates fill the enlisted ranks. Since the military draft was abolished […]
As the U.S. marks the 10th anniversary of the longest period of sustained warfare in its history, the vast majority of veterans of the post-9/11 era are proud of their military service and say it has helped them mature as human beings.
The Census Bureau today released its first estimates of the number of same-sex married couples in the U.S., as well as alternatives counts to the published data for same-sex unmarried couples that try to account for data-processing issues.
Without public debate or fanfare, large numbers of Americans enacted their own anti-poverty program in the depths of the Great Recession: They moved in with relatives.
In 1960, the median age at first marriage in the U.S. was 23 for men and 21 for women; now it is 28 for men and 26 for women. The median age for first-time mothers in 1960 was 22; now it is 24.[2. numoffset=”2″ Median age at first marriage is from U.S. Census Bureau, Current […]
Australia’s 2011 Census is this week, marking a century of census-taking in that country. The form includes a question about religion, unlike the U.S. Census form, and the statistics agency will report same-sex marriages for the first time.
A major factor explaining the relative economic well-being of cohabiters of different levels of educational attainment is the level of labor market participation and number of earners in a household. Most notably, college-educated cohabiters are more likely to work than college-educated married adults, but cohabiters without college degrees are less likely to work than married […]
The number of Americans living in multi-generational households grew more than five times as sharply as the overall population increased from 2007 to 2009, the years that spanned the Great Recession. The largest increase was among adults ages 25 to 34 who live with their parents. In 2009, a record 51.4 million Americans lived in […]
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