The Negro's church,.

202

The Negro's Church

cent. of the reported membership can be relied upon to contribute regularly.
That the membership of 220 is financially sufficient is
further doubted because of the two and a half million Negroes
gainfully employed in urban centers in the United States, one
million are in domestic service; one million are industrial
workers; a quarter of a million are skilled or semi-skilled
workers; 100,000 are in the professions; and only 70,000 are
engaged in business, including the smallest kind of business.
In other words, only 20 per cent. of the urban Negroes gainfully employed are engaged in semi-skilled, skilled or professional work, or in business, leaving 80 per cent. to be engaged in common labor or domestic work. If the semi-skilled
workers were included with the common laborers, domestic
workers, etc., the 80 per cent. would be increased.
Again, if the facts of this study can be relied upon to apply
to the urban church for the country at large, 220 members
per church are too few to enable the average church to have
at its disposal sufficient funds to carry on a vigorous, healthy
program. The highest amount spent per member by any of
the 609 churches of this study was $12.27, and it was expended by the churches with memberships of less than 500.
Assuming that each of the 220 members were regular contributors, the average urban church would have for its annual
expenditure $2,699.40. One can readily see that this is hardly
enough to make it possible for a church to employ a welltrained minister. One gets nearer to the heart of the problem,
however, if one considers actual expenditures by all churches
for 1926.
The Average Expenditure per Urban Church in the U. S.
in 1926
According to the Federal Census of Religious Bodies, 95
per cent. of all Negro urban churches, or 9,642, spent in 1926
a total of $26,402,536; an average annual expenditure of