Four Questions about American Jewish Demography

Abstract

How many Jews live in the United States? Is the number increasing or decreasing? Do more Jews live in Israel or in the United States? And do the answers to these questions matter? The controversy surrounding these issues stems from the existence of various definitions of Jewish identity as well as the methodological difficulties involved in estimating Jewish populations. It is likely that somewhere between 5.2 million and 6.4 million Jews live in the United States, with the most probable range being 6.0-6.4 million. Whether the American Jewish population is increasing, decreasing, or remaining the same is not totally clear, though it will almost certainly decrease in the future. It appears that the number of Jews in the United States is currently higher than the number in Israel, though this also is very likely to change in the future. The current and changing size of the American Jewish community has political, economic, and psychological impacts. The number of American Jews has been a constant source of debate almost since the beginning of European settlement in North America. More than 350 years ago, a group of twenty-three Jews from Recife (Brazil) fled Portuguese persecution and sought a safe haven in New Amsterdam (today New York City). These twenty-three paved the way for the later migration of millions of Jewish immigrants, first Sephardic Jews, then German Jews, and then East European Jews. But the twenty-three may be the last accurate count of American Jewry. The present situation poses four questions: 1. How many Jews live in the United States? 2. Is the Jewish population of the United States increasing, decreasing, or remaining the same?

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