MormonVideoGame Posted March 24, 2017 Author Posted March 24, 2017 (edited) 2 hours ago, JAHS said: Holy cow! Give it up already. The front page of the Glassdoor entry for the church that I provided a link to said "greater than 10,000 employees" "10000+ employees" doesn't tell us much. Edited March 24, 2017 by MormonVideoGame
thatjimguy Posted March 24, 2017 Posted March 24, 2017 I think the main purpose for the money is the real way we are going to go forward to change the world when the time is right. Take global hunger for example. Feeding the hungry is noble and should be done, but it is also a band aid to a problem that needs stitches (or even surgery). Any kind of permanent structural fix for the world is going to take tons of money. Doing any kind of piecemeal fix just wont do, or at least be very effective. Better to just go in an area at full blast and change it. So, in other words, I think they are saving up for a rainy (Noah level storms) day.
stemelbow Posted March 24, 2017 Posted March 24, 2017 18 hours ago, Robert F. Smith said: I haven't updated my study since 2012: "LDS Church Welfare Expenditures,” online at http://www.scribd.com/doc/107498713/LDS-Church-Welfare-Expenditures . However, the sources are readily available, and I'd like to see what current figures are. While I appreciate the content of your link (I found myself delighted and surprised on a few of the items listed, thanks) I don't think it qualifies as supporting your statements: "LDS humanitarian aid operations are the largest per capita of any religious organization in the world". I don't see in your link where this is addressed. Can you point it out to me? "Mormons give humanitarian aid all out of proportion to their numbers, moreso than any other religious organization per capita." Again, I don't see this addressed in yoru link. Can you point it out to me. THanks in advance. 1
Robert F. Smith Posted March 25, 2017 Posted March 25, 2017 16 hours ago, stemelbow said: While I appreciate the content of your link (I found myself delighted and surprised on a few of the items listed, thanks) I don't think it qualifies as supporting your statements: "LDS humanitarian aid operations are the largest per capita of any religious organization in the world". I don't see in your link where this is addressed. Can you point it out to me? "Mormons give humanitarian aid all out of proportion to their numbers, moreso than any other religious organization per capita." Again, I don't see this addressed in yoru link. Can you point it out to me. THanks in advance. Except for the 1953 reference, I have no data in that paper which support those assertions. What I do know is that there are a lot of wonderful religious and non-religious organizations worldwide which do a lot of good. http://www.sharefaith.com/blog/2013/06/top-4-christian-humanitarian-organizations-fighting-poverty-slavery-world-hunger/ . https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christian_humanitarian_aid . https://www.icrc.org/eng/assets/files/other/irrc_858_ferris.pdf . The bulk giving of these many organizations far exceeds the giving of the LDS Church, However, on a per capita member basis they do not appear to give at the same rate as the LDS members -- Mormons just give more per capita, not only to the LDS Church, but even to non-LDS charities. I first saw that fact asserted years ago in the Journal of Philanthropy (a non-LDS publication), which noted that SLC exhibited higher levels of charitable giving than any other American city. I do not have that reference immediately at hand just now, but other facts are equally probative: For example, in the New York Times, Jan 29, 2012, http://www.nytimes.com/imagepages/2012/01/29/sunday-review/29giving-gfx.html?ref=sunday-review , the following blog comment was made: In a recent article highlighting Mitt Romney’s charitable giving, the New York Times shared a graph that outlines the amount of giving major religions in America contribute. The LDS, or Mormon Church’s members give nearly twice as much as the denomination in the number two spot. Here’s the breakdown of the average percentage of giving per member of each denomination: Mormon: 5.6% Assemblies of God: 2.9% Nondenominational Evangelical: 2.6% Baptist: 2% Lutheran: 1.5% Jewish: 1.4% Orthodox: 1.3% Methodist: 1.2 % Episcopalian: 1.2% Presbyterian: 1.2% Catholic: .7% Muslim/Buddhist: .6% Sources: Bill Marsh/The New York Times; The campaigns; Tax Policy Center; Congressional Budget Office; Giving USA (recipients); Patrick M. Rooney, Center on Philanthropy at Indiana University (religious giving, 2004); Empty Tomb Inc. (giving trend). Moreover, LDS members were giving $1200 outside of church, while generally "American households donated a median $375 to congregations, $150 to religiously identified nonprofits, and $250 to secular charities in 2012." https://www.philanthropy.com/article/Religious-Americans-Give-More/153973 . Americans are very generous. Mormons are just more generous. On this board, Shadrack provided some 2014 figures for LDS tithing rates worldwide: his post 11, April 13, 2015, online at http://www.mormondialogue.org/topic/65216-l-d-s-membership-numbers/. I would certainly like to see someone take a look at this matter more systematically and write a report on it, providing all the nuances.
mnn727 Posted March 25, 2017 Posted March 25, 2017 8 year old children do not make $50K per year. Neither do non-working wives, or those working part time (at least in my experience at least 1/4 of wives are not employed or only working part time.) Also very few Senior citizens earn $50K I believe your premise regarding income and tithing paid is incorrect.
MormonVideoGame Posted March 25, 2017 Author Posted March 25, 2017 (edited) 13 minutes ago, mnn727 said: 8 year old children do not make $50K per year. Neither do non-working wives, or those working part time (at least in my experience at least 1/4 of wives are not employed or only working part time.) Also very few Senior citizens earn $50K Please re-read the OP. You don't think it is possible that at least 1.5 million Mormon adults make 50K or more? Edited March 25, 2017 by MormonVideoGame
Rain Posted March 25, 2017 Posted March 25, 2017 (edited) On Wednesday, March 22, 2017 at 11:45 AM, JAHS said: Let me just add to the list of things tithing pays for: Building and upkeep of Temples, Church buildings, and Administrative buildings; Administrative expenses(telephone, office supplies, postage, printing manuals and books etc.); employee salaries; building and maintaining colleges and universities; Church Education System(CES); Missionary work; Missionary training centers; Temple Square and other visitors centers; Church historical sites; insurance; accounting expenses; legal expenses; welfare farms; Deseret Industries buildings; Church Welfare program; Family History Centers, genealogy libraries and archives; and taxes; all of which are money-consuming assets and not money-producing assets. I am sure there are some things I have missed, but it adds up fast. The church also does not go into debt for any of these things; they pay as they go. LDS.org, mormon.org, providentliving.org etc. I know justserve.org took a lot of money to start up. This site gives some ideas of the costs of running websites. Now some of those costs would be duplicated by the employee salories mentioned above, but from what I have read, it should be pretty obvious the websites are not cheap. Edited March 25, 2017 by Rain 1
Rain Posted March 25, 2017 Posted March 25, 2017 Not all tithe payers pay on gross. A good number pay on net - from informal surveys I have seen done over the years. Then we have some paying on surplus. 1
mnn727 Posted March 31, 2017 Posted March 31, 2017 (edited) On 3/25/2017 at 2:32 AM, MormonVideoGame said: Please re-read the OP. You don't think it is possible that at least 1.5 million Mormon adults make 50K or more? Re-read the OP yourself: Quote 54% of US Mormons make at least 50,000 dollars, see http://www.pewforum.org/2009/07/24/a-portrait-of-mormons-in-the-us/#4 And if you read the entire link, you'll see it was talking about family income, not individual income. Garbage in - garbage out. Edited March 31, 2017 by mnn727 2
MormonVideoGame Posted April 1, 2017 Author Posted April 1, 2017 (edited) 21 hours ago, mnn727 said: Re-read the OP yourself: And if you read the entire link, you'll see it was talking about family income, not individual income. Garbage in - garbage out. Ned Flanders I come back only to respond to your comment, it's not like my thoughts are important here. There are about 4 million Mormon ADULTS in the USA, isn't it fair to assume that 1.5 million Mormon households give at least 5,000? You keep the garbage out. The population in Utah is about 3 million, it's not hard to imagine there are about 1.5 million middle class households (LDS) in the entire country. Edited April 1, 2017 by MormonVideoGame
thesometimesaint Posted April 1, 2017 Posted April 1, 2017 Population is based on number of people in a given area, not just adults. You misusing statistics to conflate mean with median. A tithe of $5,000 is an income of $50.000. Not outside the realm of possible, but there are other factors in play. SEE http://www.sltrib.com/news/1585040-155/utah-income-percent-household-data-growth
MormonVideoGame Posted April 1, 2017 Author Posted April 1, 2017 1 hour ago, thesometimesaint said: Population is based on number of people in a given area, not just adults. I used Pew data of US adults to get the 4 million. 1 hour ago, thesometimesaint said: You misusing statistics to conflate mean with median. 54% of US Mormons (or households) make 50K or more, which means 50K is not the average at all. In fact 20% make more than 100K. Even if I am wrong about the 1.5 million, it would not be way off.
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