Charted: Pennsylvania's LGBT population
Add Axios as your preferred source to
see more of our stories on Google.
About 5.8% of Pennsylvania adults identify as LGBT, just higher than the national rate of 5.5%, an Axios analysis found.
Why it matters: It's difficult to pin down the exact size of the LGBT population nationwide or in any given state, in part because gold-standard data collection efforts like the decennial census or the American Community Survey lack specific relevant questions.
- Yet having some sense of the LGBT community's size is vital for meeting its public health and other policy needs.
Details: The estimates come by way of the Williams Institute, a UCLA Law think tank.
- They're based on combined 2020-2021 data from the Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance System, a CDC effort to collect wide-ranging health info through phone surveys.
Zoom in: Pennsylvanians in the 18-24 age bracket account for nearly 17% of the state's LGBT population, per the analysis.
- Nearly 10% of those between 25-34 years old identify as LGBT, 4.5% of those 35-49, 2.9% of those 50-64 and 1.9% of those 65 or older.
Reality check: These findings are based on self-reporting, and people in states with hostile attitudes toward LGBT communities may be less forthcoming about their identity amid a rise in hate crimes and threats..
What they're saying: "The world is changing around us, and we have to think about what that means to shift environments and policies so that everybody can live well and live safely," Williams Institute research director Kerith Conron tells Axios.