- June is Pride Month, and more and more US adults self-identify as
LGBT , according to Gallup. - The
Census Bureau's American Community Survey includes data on how many households in a state aresame-sex couples. - Delaware had the highest share, excluding DC, of same-sex couple households in a state at 1.3%.
June is Pride Month, and an increasing share of US adults identify as LGBT.
According to Gallup, 5.6% of Americans 18 and over identified as LGBT in 2020, up from 3.5% in 2012. Additionally, 54.6% of LGBT adults self-identified as bisexual in 2020. At the generation level, 15.9% of Gen Z identified as LGBT compared to 9.1% of millennials and 3.8% of Gen X.
"One of the main reasons LGBT identification has been increasing over time is that younger generations are far more likely to consider themselves to be something other than heterosexual," Gallup wrote.
Data from the Census Bureau also provides some information about LGBTQ+ adults. The Census' American Community Survey has data about who makes up households, including same-sex married and unmarried couples.
Based on the 2019 American Community Survey, the most recent year with data available, there were 980,276 same-sex couple households in the US. Among same-sex couple households, 568,110 or 58% were same-sex married couple households. Less than 1% of the 122,802,852 total US households, 0.8%, were same-sex couple households in 2019.
We can further see the breakdown at the state level. The following
Delaware had the highest share of households in the state that are same-sex couples. In Delaware, 4,793 of the 376,239 households, or 1.3%, were same-sex couple households in 2019. DC had an even higher share at 2.4%, where 7,003 of the 291,570 households were same-sex households in 2019. On the other hand, North Dakota had the smallest share among households in the state at 0.2% or 785 households.
Although Delaware had the highest share among households in the state, California had the largest number. There were 85,104 same-sex married couple households and 50,752 same-sex unmarried couple households for a total of 135,856. That means 1.0% of households in California are same-sex couples.
Overall, the Census Bureau wrote 65.1% of same-sex couples in 2019 had both partners working, higher than the 51.1% among opposite-sex couples. Male same-sex couples had a slightly larger percentage of both partners working compared to female same-sex couples at 75.8% and 72.6% respectively.
Additionally, the Census Bureau found based on the Current Population Survey that 14.7% of same-sex couples in the US in 2019 had at least one child under 18 at home. That is lower than the 37.8% for opposite-sex couples. This may in part explain why same-sex couples are more likely to have both partners working than opposite-sex couples.
"The presence of young children may influence a couple's decision to have one parent stay home to care for the children," the Census Bureau wrote.
The percent share of same-sex couples with children where both parents were employed was higher than the share for opposite-sex couples, at 72.4% and 65.6% respectively, based on 2019 data from the American Community Survey. The shares were still higher for same-sex couples than opposite-sex couples when looking at working partners with children under 6 and between 6 to 17.
The Census Bureau notes things like age and marital status may also play some role in the differences in percentages between both partners working for same-sex and opposite-sex couples.