New Estimates Show U.S. Muslim Population Will Be 2nd largest religion by 2040

New Estimates Show U.S. Muslim Population Will Be Second Largest Religion by 2040

New Estimates Show U.S. Muslim Population Will Be 2nd largest religion by 2040

Islam Will Overtake Judaism

A new report published by Pew Research reveals that Muslims will in all probability be the second biggest religious group in America after Christians by 2040. The published report said that the United States is home to 3.45 million Muslims in 2017. They constitute 1.1 percent of total US population. Right now Jews form the second biggest population on the basis of religion. It is estimated that American Muslims will number about 8.1 million within 2050. The number translates into 2.1 percent.

New Estimates Show U.S. Muslim Population Will Be 2nd largest religion by 2040[/tweetthis]

According to estimates done by Pew Research Center, the number of Muslims resident in the United States in 2017 comes to 3.45 million. Until now, Muslims are not as numerous as Jews. However, the Muslim population will multiply much quicker compared to the Jewish population. The estimate takes into account the 2017 survey done on American Muslims. The report elaborated on the population of Muslims among the immigrants and a number of other demographic groups. Data was taken from Census Bureau.

The Pew Report pointed out the uneven distribution of Muslims across the United States. Large swathes of the Muslim population are found in metro areas like Washington DC. A few states like New Jersey have twice the number of Muslims as the national average. Then there are a number of counties and states where Muslims are almost negligible in numbers.

Even if Muslims become the second largest minority religion, it is far less than the number of Christians. The latter dominates the American population by constituting 71 percent of it. When Pew did its first in 2007, it estimated the number of Muslims to be 2.35 million across all ages. A repeat study in 2011 found it to increase to 2.75 million. The Muslim population continued to grow by about 100,000 every year. This is due to better fertility rates among the Muslim American population. It helped that a considerable number of Muslims also migrated to the United States during this period.

Contrary to popular perception, the number of Muslims have not increased much due to religious conversion. This is due to the fact that many American Muslims leave the Islamic faith. This balances out Americans adopting Islam as their belief system. It was found that one in five new converts were initially born into a different religion prior to converting to Islam. Almost the same number left Islam or no longer tend to identify themselves as Muslim.

Resources

Follow the Conversation on Twitter