More than 2 Million Identify as Transgender on Survey

The Census Bureau's Household Pulse Survey does more than track the impact of the coronavirus pandemic on American households. In an effort to determine whether some groups have been impacted by the pandemic more than others, the survey asks a nationally representative sample of the public about gender identity and sexual orientation.

Gender identity

Among the nation's 252 million adults aged 18 or older, 2.4 million identify themselves as transgender, according to the most recent Household Pulse Survey, fielded March 30–April 11. Here's the breakdown by gender identity...

Male at birth: 123 million

Cisgender male: 118 million (96% of total male adults)

Female at birth: 129 million

Cisgender female: 124 million (96% of total female adults)

Transgender: 2.4 million

None of these: 4.8 million

Did not report: 5.1 million

Ninety-six percent of the nation's adults are cisgender—meaning they identify with their sex at birth. An estimated 2.4 million Americans are transgender (0.9 percent of adults). An even larger 5 million say they do not identify with any of the categories, and another 5 million did not answer the question. 

Sexual orientation

Among the nation's 252 million adults aged 18 or older, 19 million say their sexual orientation is gay, lesbian, or bisexual. Here's the breakdown...

Straight: 218 million 

Gay or lesbian: 8.4 million 

Bisexual: 10.9 million

Something else: 5.1 million 

Don't know: 4.8 million

Did not report: 5.1 million

Overall, 86 percent of American adults say their sexual orientation is straight. Fourteen percent of adults identify themselves as lesbian, gay, bisexual, "something else," "don't know," or they did not answer the question. 

Source: Census Bureau, Week 44 Household Pulse Survey, March 30–April 11  

Sexual Orientation by Generation, 2016

Among adults aged 18 or older, 5 percent identify themselves as gay, lesbian, or bisexual. The percentage is as high as 12 percent among the youngest adults...

Percent identifying themselves as gay, lesbian, or bisexual
iGeneration (18 to 21): 12.3%
Millennials (22 to 39): 6.9%
Gen Xers (40 to 51): 5.2%
Boomers (52 to 70): 3.6%
Older (71 or older): 1.7%

Source: Demo Memo analysis of the 2016 General Social Survey

LGBT Identification by State

LGBT identification is increasing nationally and in most states, finds a Gallup survey. Nationally, 4.1 percent of Americans identified themselves as lesbian, gay, bisexual, or transgender in 2016, up from 3.5 percent in 2012. In the District of Columbia, 8.6 percent of the population identifies as LGBT. By state, the figure ranges from a high of 5.3 percent in Vermont to a low of 2.0 percent in South Dakota

States with highest LGBT identification

5.3% in Vermont

4.9% in Massachusetts, California, and Oregon

4.8% in Nevada

States with lowest LGBT identification

2.8% in Idaho

2.7% in North Dakota

2.0% in South Dakota

Source: Gallup, Vermont Leads States in LGBT Identification

LGBT Identification by Generation

Overall, 4.1 percent of Americans aged 18 or older personally identify as lesbian, gay, bisexual, or transgender, according to a Gallup survey. This figure is up from 3.5 percent in 2012. By generation, the percentage who identify themselves as LGBT looks like this...

LGBT identification by generation
7.3% of Millennials
3.2% of Gen Xers
2.4% of Baby Boomers
1.4% of older Americans

Why are Millennials more likely than older generations to identify themselves as LGBT? "Millennials are the first generation in the U.S. to grow up in an environment where social acceptance of the LGBT community markedly increased," says Gallup. "This may be an important factor in explaining their greater willingness to identify as LGBT."

Source: Gallup, In U.S., More Adults Identifying as LGBT

Sexual Identity of High School Students

More than 1 in 10 high school students identifies as gay, lesbian, bisexual, or "not sure," according to a government survey. The CDC's Youth Risk Behavior Surveillance System survey asked a representative sample of students in grades 9 through 12 about their sexual identity with these results...

Sexual identity of high school students
Heterosexual: 88.8%
Gay or lesbian: 2.0%
Bisexual: 6.0%
Not sure: 3.2%

Among high school girls, 84.5 percent identify themselves as heterosexual or straight. Among high school boys, the figure is 93.1 percent.

Source: CDC, Sexual Identity, Sex of Sexual Contacts, and Health-Related Behaviors among Students in Grades 9–12—United States and Selected Sites, 2015

Mining Big Data for Transgender Information

It's not easy to uncover information about the nation's transgender population. The Census Bureau does not include questions about sexual orientation or gender identity in the decennial census or American Community Survey. But there are other ways to shed light on the transgender segment—such as mining big data.

An economist at the Census Bureau, Benjamin Cerf Harris, has done just that. Harris mined the Social Security Administration's big data to determine whether transgender information could be gleaned from SSA records. By sifting through millions of Social Security files from 1936 to 2010, Harris located those in which a first name had been legally changed from male to female or female to male and also located those in which the sex-coding had changed. He found tens of thousands of transgender-consistent changes: 106,550 cases (at a 95 percent confidence threshold) in which a person aged 16 or older had legally changed his or her first name from one gender to another, and 28,234 cases in which there had been a first-name change and a sex-coding change. Overall, about 0.2 percent of files are what Harris calls "transgender consistent." The average age of identity change was mid-thirties.

The mining effort didn't stop there. For the transgender-consistent individuals who were still alive in 2010, Harris matched them to their census record and examined their response to the 2010 census question, "What is your sex?" He finds the transgender-consistents were more likely than non-transgender respondents to report being male and female (0.13 percent vs. 0.02 percent) or to report no sex at all (1.85 percent versus 1.13 percent). Harris also used 2010 census records to determine the geographical distribution of the likely transgender population.

Harris cautions that his research is not an attempt to estimate the size of the transgender population. Rather, it is an effort to show how big data can be mined to reveal something about the transgender population.

Source: Census Bureau, Likely Transgender Individuals in U.S. Federal Administrative Records and the 2010 Census

Americans Overestimate Gay and Lesbian Population

The public is wildly wrong when it comes to estimating the size of the gay, lesbian, bisexual, or transgender population in the U.S., according to a Gallup survey. When asked to estimate the percentage of Americans who are gay or lesbian, 23 percent is the average guess. In fact, a much smaller 3.8 percent of adults identify themselves as LGBT.

Source: Gallup, Americans Greatly Overestimate Percent Gay, Lesbian in U.S.

Questions about Sexual Orientation

It's not easy to ask people about their sexual orientation. In fact, the federal government spent 11 years studying the best way to phrase the question for the 2013 National Health Interview Survey, using in-depth interviews to determine the right words. One finding from this research was that the terms "gay," "lesbian," and "straight" are less confusing to the public than the terms "homosexual" and "heterosexual."

Overall, 97 percent of men and women aged 18 or older identified themselves as "straight" in the 2013 survey, and 2 percent said they were gay, lesbian, or bisexual. Some (0.6 percent) refused to answer the question and the same small percentage said they were "something else" or "don't know."

When the few who said they were "something else" were further questioned by interviewers, the 39 percent plurality said they didn't use labels to identify themselves. When the few who answered "don't know" were questioned further, the 30 percent plurality said they were in the process of figuring out their sexuality.

Source: National Center for Health Statistics, Sexual Orientation in the 2013 National Health Interview Survey: A Quality Assessment (PDF)

Sexual Orientation and Health Status, 2013

The federal government is now tracking the health of Americans by sexual orientation. Beginning in 2013, questions about sexual orientation were included in the National Health Interview Survey, allowing government researchers to examine the health status, health behaviors, and health care access of the U.S. population by sexual orientation.

"Which of the following best represents how you think of yourself?" is the question asked by the National Health Interview Survey. Respondents could identify themselves as gay, lesbian, bisexual, or straight. Overall, 97.7 percent of Americans identify themselves as straight, including 97.8 percent of men and 97.7 percent of women. There are significant differences by age in the percentage who identify themselves as gay, lesbian, or bisexual...

Percentage who are gay, lesbian, or bisexual
Total, aged 18-plus: 2.3%
Aged 18 to 44: 2.9%
Aged 45 to 64: 2.2%
Aged 65-plus: 0.8%

Differences in health status by sexual orientation were evident in this first look. Among 18-to-64-year-olds, those who identify themselves as gay, lesbian, or bisexual are more likely than those who are straight to smoke cigarettes. Bisexual men and women are more likely than their straight counterparts to have experienced serious psychological distress in the past 30 days. Health insurance coverage, prevalence of obesity, physical fitness, and more is in the report.

Source: National Center for Health Statistics, Sexual Orientation and Health among U.S. Adults: National Health Interview Survey, 2013

National Adult Tobacco Survey

Electronic cigarettes are new, their use is increasingly common, and they are controversial. Just in time to shed some light on this matter, the CDC recently surveyed tobacco use among Americans aged 18 or older, finding this percentage using tobacco either "some days" or "every day"...

Any tobacco: 21.3%

Cigarettes: 18.0%

Smokeless: 2.6%

Cigars: 2.0%

E-cigarettes: 1.9%

Hookah: 0.5%

Regular pipe: 0.3%

The CDC's National Adult Tobacco Survey collected data on the use of each type of tobacco product by sex, age, race, region, education, household income, and sexual orientation. Yes, sexual orientation. Tobacco use in general, and e-cigs in particular, are more popular among those who identify themselves as LGBT than among heterosexuals. Among LGBT, 4.5 percent use e-cigs at least some days. This compares with only 1.9 percent of heterosexuals.

Source: CDC, Tobacco Product Use among Adults—United States, 2012-2013