More on the dogs and children issue

OK. I am convinced it's at least plausible that there are more dogs than children in Seattle. There do not seem to be any hard numbers available for number of dogs by city.

But Phil Longman kindly and cleverly answers my earlier question on this matter. Here is his approach, slightly edited:

...according to an Internet description, http://www.avma.org/membshp/marketstats/formulas.asp,
has a formula for estimating pet ownership by community.
It is .58 dogs per household.

These are national averages, but if we make the (heroic?) assumption that Seattle has a "normal" rate of dog ownership, we could see if that produced more or fewer dogs than kids.

Number of households in Seattle (2000):      258,499

(Source: http://www.ofm.wa.gov/census2000/profiles/place/1605363000.pdf)

Estimated Number of dogs:                

258,499
x .58
=149,929

Number of Children (2000)
Under 5 to 19 years . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 103,747

So unless Seattle does have substantially lower rate of dog ownership than the nation as a whole, it would appear to have more dogs than kids, even if we count teenagers as kids.

Hmm.  How does that compare with Salt Lake City, I wonder, with all those fertile, Republican Mormons?

Number of Households in Salt Lake City (2000):     71,461

(Source:
http://www.slcgov.com/info/area_info/census/pdfs/dp-1.pdf)

Estimated Number of dogs:

71,461
x.58
=41,448

Number of Children (2000) http://www.slcgov.com/info/area_info/census/pdfs/dp-1.pdf
Under 5 to 19 years . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 49,262

To summarize:

(click)

So, it appears, Salt Lake City has more kids than dogs, and Seattle more dogs than kids. 

Any thoughts?

Yes but mostly a question: "OK, now what's the significance?" I'll post Phil's response later.

Comments

[Jarrett]

I earnestly hope that dog ownership rates are lower in a dense city like Seattle than in the general population. And cat ownership higher.

[David Sucher]

Hmmm...why? Dogs are great and I find no problem, for myself, with having lots of them around.

And, btw, Seattle is not really very dense; it's a 1920s to 50s suburb, for the most part. Vast, vast areas of it --- 75% I'd bet? -- are single-family detached with a typical lot size of 4-7000 SF. It's really quite suburban in feel.