ABC News:

I know I am on everyones shit list because I dislike kos, but I do cover issues hardly anyone else gives a shit about. Here is just one issue that I think the Democrats should prioritize that is absolutely not on the kossack or mainstream Democratic agenda. For years the republicans have been able to undercut social programs by portraying the poor as morally inferior. They have even gotten mainstream economics departments at Universities to put out this kind of stuff. The mainstream news often reports these kinds of "spun" statistics without recongnizing that they are really carefully disguised op/eds, rather than careful research.


ABC News: Church-going boosts economic well-being: study:

"'Doubling the frequency of attendance leads to a 9.1 percent increase in household income, or a rise of 5.5 percent as a fraction of the poverty scale,' Jonathan Gruber of the economics department at Massachusetts Institute of Technology wrote in his study.

'Those with more faith may be less 'stressed out' about daily problems that impede success in the labor market and the marriage market, and therefore are more successful,' Gruber wrote in the study, which was released by the National Bureau of Economic Research.
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Could it be the opposite is true? Maybe a 9.1 percent increase in household income, or a rise of 5.5 percent as a fraction of the poverty scale actually leads to a doubling of church attendence. Maybe less stress in one job and marriage and more personal success also leads to more church attendence.

Living in a community with complementary ethnic groups that share the same religion increases the frequency of going to a house of worship, he said in the paper titled 'Religious Market Structure, Religious Participation, and Outcomes: Is Religion Good for You?'

According to this study you also need to strenuously avoid contact with other religious and ethnic groups to be successful, particularly if you are white.

Such visits correlate to higher levels of education and income, lower levels of welfare receipt and disability, higher levels of marriage and lower levels of divorce, the study said."

Could it be that higher levels of education and income, more wealth and better health, not to mention better marriages also lead to more church attendence?

This appears to be one of those "the rich are morally superior to the poor spin jobs" that often masks itself as hard science. It is sad MIT is subsidizing it.