I have seen a lot of these articles lately that single out “evangelicalism” and seem to link that with conservatism and with low-income regions. Some articles go so far as to make correlations with health, longevity, education level, drug addiction, etc.

I don’t understand all this interest in evangelicals. You’d think that Catholics, Mormons, and mainline Protestants would be of equal interest. There is nothing sinister or inherently evil about evangelicals—it’s sort of an ill-defined term. Hillary Clinton, for example, is an evangelical. Could it be because of a few high-profile televangelists?

It’s easy to see why Protestantism is more prominent in the South, and why in general Southern states have a somewhat lower median income. During the last half of the nineteenth century through the early part of the twentieth, Catholic and Lutheran immigrants from Europe flocked into the industrializing manufacturing regions— hence those regions are today predominantly Catholic, and they have more wealth. The South, settled earlier by British Protestants, remained chiefly agricultural. For various reasons agricultural regions tend to be conservative.

I don’t know why all these correlations even need to be made. Correlation is not causation.

I agree though that rising percentages of the unaffiliated is a good trend. It means that more people are thinking for themselves and asserting themselves.