“
The Few. The Proud. The Marines.” This is the award-winning
advertising slogan of the US Marine Corps. With some adjustment, it
may soon apply to the condition of Reform and other committed Jews
from the vital religious center. That’s one critical inference emerging from the
Jewish Community Study of New York: 2011
that we wrote, and which was
sponsored by the UJA-Federation of New York.
The study we conducted encompassed Jews living in Westchester, Long
Island, and the five boroughs of New York. We found 1.54 million Jews in the
eight-counties, 9% more than in 2002. The increase derived primarily from
high birthrates among the Haredi Orthodox, and growing longevity (13% of
the Jews are age 75 and over, as compared with just 5% in 1991). In addition,
we observed more “Jews-by-personal-choice,” people who identify as Jews,
do not have a Jewish parent, and have not undergone formal religious
conversion; they outnumber converts by 3:1.
The Orthodox population increased by about one third since 2002. In
contrast, over the last two decades in the New York area, Reform and
Conservative numbers plummeted. From 2002 to 2011, the number of Jews
in Reform households – both congregationally affiliated and not – fell from
345,000
to 303,000, a drop of 12% in nine years. In 1991, 36% of Jews in the
eight-county New York area called themselves Reform (even as most of them
did not belong to Reform temples). By 2011, the number fell to 23%. In the
same period, Conservative identification also fell, dropping from 34% to 19%.
The prospects for Reform and Conservative identities holding their market
shares of the population do not look good, if only because Orthodoxy is
poised to grow dramatically. Today, the Orthodox constitute just
one fifth
of the area’s Jewish households; but these households are home to
three
fifths
of the New York area’s Jewish children.
Wildly contrasting birthrates are the key to understanding these demo-
graphic shifts. Among women 35-44, a group with nearly completed fertility,
Hasidic women report an average of nearly six children currently living in
their household, while the Modern Orthodox average 2.5. For the non-
Orthodox the comparable figure rests at 1.3.
The adverse population consequences of non-Orthodox Jews’ low overall
fertility are further exacerbated by intermarriage. While 98% of all inmarried
Jewish households raise their children as Jews, just 31% of the children in
intermarried homes are being raised as exclusively Jewish. The long-term
impact of the low percentage raised Jewish among intermarried couples is
underscored by a high intermarriage rate. Among the non-Orthodox, the
intermarriage rate reached 50% for couples married after 2006.
But, perhaps paradoxically, while the demographic picture among Reform
(
and Conservative) Jews is troubling, the same cannot be said for their
quality of Jewish engagement and community, especially for those who
are congregationally affiliated. For example, younger Reform Jews report
significantly higher rates of Jewish schooling than do Reform Jews their
parents’ age. Similarly, in comparing younger with older Reform Jews, we
find that attending Jewish camp also moved upward, such that 40% of
Reform adults age 18-34 have been to a Jewish camp.
Still other positive signs emerge. We found evidence suggesting that Jewish
camping makes a clear contribution to adult Jewish engagement. Reform
synagogues attract those more Jewishly engaged; to some extent, temple
membership encourages and supports Jewish engagement. To take one
telling statistic: 15% of Reform non-members say they attend a
Shabbat
meal at least “sometimes;” for the members, it’s 59%.
Indeed, in the same 2002-2011 period that Reform identifiers fell, Reform
congregational affiliation patterns were stable. From 2002 to 2011, the number
of affiliated Reform households held steady (60,000 vs. 62,000) as did the
number of Jews in affiliated Reform households (152,000 vs. 154,000). Yet
all is not rosy in this domain, as the number of children in Reform congregations
fell markedly, from 37,000 in 2002 to 32,000 in 2011 – a drop of over 13%
for the nine years, or about 1.5% per year.
Page 2
Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion
Encouraging Engagement,
Disturbing Demography
Dr. Steven M. Cohen,
Research Professor of Jewish Social Policy, HUC-JIR/New York,
Jack Ukeles, and Ron Miller
Number of Jewish persons in
synagogue
member households
154,000
Number of Jewish persons in
synagogue
member households
152,000
Number of Jewish persons in unaffiliated Reform households
149,000
Number of Jewish persons in unaffiliated Reform households
193,000
Percent of households that are synagogue members
41%
Number of member households
37%
Number of Jewish children in synagogue
member households
32,000
Number of Jewish children in synagogue member households
37,300
Number of member households
62,000
Number of member households
60,000
2011
2002
Attends Services
Shabbat Meal Some-
Closest Friends
Monthly or More times or More Often Are Mostly Jewish
Congregational Members
Reform
22%
59%
55%
Nonmembers
Reform
2%
15%
42%
Reform Households 2002 vs. 2011
Percent Affirming Selected Jewish-Engagement Activities by
Denomination and Congregational Membership, Jewish Respondents
