LDS Church Growth and Attrition 1977 to 2013

According to this graph I prepared for Wikipedia, LDS official membership growth rate, while the lowest it has been since the 1930's, is currently about double the world population growth rate.

Another graph I prepared that has not been published elsewhere shows LDS Church baptisms, missionary service, and death/attrition rates since the 1990's.  Baptism and growth rates were declining in the early 2000's, and now seem essentially flat, with annual membership growth around 2.2% (double the world population growth rate).  Current death/attrition rates look lower than in the 1990's, but it's hard to discern any trend.  While it doesn't stand out on the graph, missionary service declined from 0.55% in the 1990's to 0.37% in recent years, a 1/3 reduction in missionary prevalence in ten years.

Of these numbers, the most difficult and least reliable are attritions/deaths and membership.  Some members simply disappear quietly, and it's impossible to know whether they are still affiliated or how long they remain alive.  I believe that it is church practice to keep a record of each lost individual until a certain standard age (such as 110 years), and to count membership from actual records on hand rather than applying something like actuarial death rate estimates.  While this individualized approach makes pastoral sense in that "every one is known", it is not demographically accurate.  We can say that the total membership numbers reported are an accurate count of the records the church has on hand of members not determined to be dead, and that this approach appears to be consistent over time.  Even if it overestimates the number of church members, it is useful in a relative sense.

Baptisms of children, on the other hand, are real events that come from real members.  And missionary service is a real event that comes from devout members.  Confounding factors like family size trends and female mission trends make it hard to tease precise indications of church strength from these numbers.  But in our favor are long-standing sustained expectations that all children are baptized at age eight and that all young men serve a mission after high school.  Child baptism prevalence slid from over 2% in the 1960's (not graphed) to around 0.9% through the last decade.  Missionary service prevalence declined from a high of 0.55% in the 1990's to 0.37% in recent years, a 1/3 reduction in missionary prevalence in one decade.

It is interesting to note that if we compare missionaries serving to the number of child baptisms 12 years earlier, it was around 70% 1987-1994, rose to around 80% 1997-2002, then declined to around 70% or slightly lower 2008-2012 before the missionary age was reduced.

Notes

1. When an infant is blessed by the elders of the church, her name is added to the records of the church, and thus she becomes a "child of record".  When a child of record is baptized at age 8, the baptism does not increase the membership of the church.  But if the child is not baptized before age 9, his membership status is changed from member to unbaptized, and he is no longer counted as a member.  Failure of children of record to be baptized is one form of attrition.  The graphs don't reflect the true complexity of this accounting rule.

2. I don't know how the records of aged members are removed if no notice is given of their death or attrition.

3.  The formula used to calculate the annual world population growth rate from sporadic estimates is R=(P2/P1)^(1/N)-1, where P2 is the second estimated population, P1 is the first estimated population, and N is the number of years between the two estimates.  From this formula, annual values and lagging 10-year averages were calculated.

Source Data

End of	Year value	Official total membership	Full-time missionaries	Convert Baptisms	Children Baptized	World population per HYDE
1829	1829	6
1830	1830	280				1138392564
1	1831	680
2	1832	2661
3	1833	3140
4	1834	4372
5	1835	8835
6	1836	13293
7	1837	16282
8	1838	17881
9	1839	16460
40	1840	16865				1192729394
1	1841	19856
2	1842	23564
3	1843	25980
4	1844	26146
5	1845	30332
6	1846	33993
7	1847	34694
8	1848	40477
9	1849	48160
50	1850	51839				1244327949
1	1851	52165
2	1852	52640
3	1853	64154
4	1854	68429
5	1855	63974
6	1856	63881
7	1857	55236
8	1858	55755
9	1859	57038
60	1860	61082				1270044073
1	1861	66211
2	1862	68780
3	1863	71770
4	1864	74348
5	1865	76771
6	1866	77884
7	1867	81124
8	1868	84622
9	1869	88432
70	1870	90130				1309430136
1	1871	95596
2	1872	98152
3	1873	101538
4	1874	103916
5	1875	107167
6	1876	111111
7	1877	115065
8	1878	125046
9	1879	128386
80	1880	133628				1397685022
1	1881	140733
2	1882	145604
3	1883	151593
4	1884	158242
5	1885	164130
6	1886	166653
7	1887	173029
8	1888	180294
9	1889	183144
90	1890	188263				1516025314
1	1891	195445
2	1892	200961
3	1893	214534
4	1894	222369
5	1895	231116
6	1896	241427
7	1897	255736
8	1898	267251
9	1899	271681
1900	1900	283765				1633848213
1	1901	292931
2	1902	299105
3	1903	304901
4	1904	324289
5	1905	332048
6	1906	345014
7	1907	357913
8	1908	371472
9	1909	377279
10	1910	398478				1753594443
1	1911	407291
2	1912	417555
3	1913	431607
4	1914	454718
5	1915	466238
6	1916	477321
7	1917	488038
8	1918	495962
9	1919	507961
20	1920	525987				1888034127
1	1921	548803
2	1922	566358
3	1923	575896
4	1924	597861
5	1925	613572
6	1926	623909
7	1927	644745
8	1928	655686
9	1929	663652
30	1930	670017				2073363421
1	1931	688435
2	1932	703949
3	1933	717619
4	1934	730738
5	1935	746384
6	1936	760690
7	1937	767752
8	1938	784764
9	1939	803528	2216	7877	14412
40	1940	862664				2299541939
1	1941	892080
2	1942	917715
3	1943	937050
4	1944	954004	592	4957	16106
5	1945	979454
6	1946	996505
7	1947	1016170
8	1948	1041970
9	1949	1078671	5313	14700	22808
50	1950	1111314				2528313293
1	1951	1147157
2	1952	1189053
3	1953	1246362
4	1954	1302240	4687	21669	32807
5	1955	1357274				2767727535
6	1956	1416731
7	1957	1488314
8	1958	1555799
9	1959	1616088	9097	48586	42189
60	1960	1693180				3035624545
1	1961	1823661
2	1962	1965786				3155862958
3	1963	2117451
4	1964	2234916	12585	82455	49413
5	1965	2395932				3351348699
6	1966	2480899				3420389193
7	1967	2614340
8	1968	2684073
9	1969	2807456	14387	79126	55210
70	1970	2930810				3696590163
1	1971	3090953
2	1972	3218908
3	1973	3306658		79603	48578	3923325629
4	1974	3409987		69018	47234
5	1975	3572202		95412	50263	4073741819
6	1976	3742749		133959	52281
7	1977	3969220	25300	167939	62000
8	1978	4166854	27669	152000	63000
9	1979	4404121	29454	193000	67000
80	1980	4639822	29953	211000	65000	4442296596
1	1981	4920449	29700	224000	69000
2	1982	5162619	26300	207000	67000
3	1983	5351724	26565	189419	69000
4	1984	5641054	27655	192983	69000
5	1985	5919483	29265	197640	70000	4843949085
6	1986	6166974	31803	216210	72000
7	1987	6394314	34750	227284	75000
8	1988	6721210	36132	256515	73000
9	1989	7308444	39739	318940	75000
90	1990	7761179	43651	330877	78000	5279521283
1	1991	8089848	43395	297770	75000
2	1992	8404087	46025	274477	77380
3	1993	8689168	48708	304808	76312
4	1994	9024368	47311	300730	72538
5	1995	9338859	48631	304330	71139	5692354537
6	1996	9692441	52938	321385	81017
7	1997	10071783	56531	317798	75214
8	1998	10354241	57853	299134	76829	5930407103
9	1999	10752986	58593	306171	84118	6008326071
2000	2000	11068861	60784	273973	81450	6085574386
1	2001	11394522	60850	292612	69522
2	2002	11721548	61638	283138	81132	6238183321
3	2003	11985254	56237	242923	99457
4	2004	12275822	51067	241239	98870
5	2005	12560869	52060	243108	93150	6464751609
6	2006	12868606	53164	272845	94066	6540285038
7	2007	13193999	52686	279218	93698	6615854053
8	2008	13508509	52494	265593	123502	6691483957
9	2009	13824854	51736	280106	119722
10	2010	14131467	52225	272814	120528	6842925208
1	2011	14441346	55410	281312	119917
2	2012	14782473	58990	272330	122273
3	2013	15082028	83035	282945	115486
4	2014
5	2015					7219433211