Based on the period of 3 March 2007 to 3 December 2007, the US
amateur radio individual licensee totals have changed as follows:

New: 20,901 Expired: 19,739

Compared to an averaged 9 month period prior to 3 March 2007:*

New: 16,957 Expired: 21,822

The total number of individual licensees was 711,175 on 3 Mar 07
and that changed to 711,892 on 3 Dec 07 for a net gain of 717 in
nine months. That is a 0.1% growth rate.

* Prior 12 month period total changes divided by 12, then multiplied
by 9 to approximate a 9-month averaged period for comparison.

In short, nothing much has happened to numbers, no significant
changes either way. Class changes are another matter. All data
obtained from www.hamdata.com FCC Information page.

73, Len AF6AY

AF6AY wrote:
Based on the period of 3 March 2007 to 3 December 2007, the US
amateur radio individual licensee totals have changed as follows:

New: 20,901 Expired: 19,739

Compared to an averaged 9 month period prior to 3 March 2007:*

New: 16,957 Expired: 21,822

In short, nothing much has happened to numbers, no significant
changes either way. Class changes are another matter. All data
obtained from www.hamdata.com FCC Information page.


Interesting numbers, Len

We have a continuation of the dropoff of (almost certainly) inactive
Hams. Not too surprising there, if a person subscribes to the idea that
a lot of folks who once used 2 meters as a sort of "pre cell phone cell
phone" had migrated over to cell phones to get their communication needs
taken care of.

I think that that will continue until around 2009-10.

The number that I think is most important is the new license numbers.
People are still getting licenses, and at a healthy rate.

- 73 de Mike N3LI -

On Dec 4, 1:02 am, AF6AY wrote:

Based on the period of 3 March 2007 to 3 December 2007, the US
amateur radio individual licensee totals have changed as follows:

New: 20,901 Expired: 19,739

Compared to an averaged 9 month period prior to 3 March 2007:*

New: 16,957 Expired: 21,822

The total number of individual licensees was 711,175 on 3 Mar 07
and that changed to 711,892 on 3 Dec 07 for a net gain of 717 in
nine months.

The above numbers include licenses which have expired but are in the 2
year grace period. AF6AY is using the term "expired" in a different
way than FCC defines it. Hamdata.com avoids the confusion by using the
phrase "no longer licensed".

That is a 0.1% growth rate.

In short, nothing much has happened to numbers, no significant
changes either way.

IMHO, it is significant that the license numbers were slowly
decreasing from 2003 to 2007, and are now slowly increasing. The
growth may be slight but at least it is not a loss.

Class changes are another matter.

Let's take a look:

Using the number of unexpired current licenses held by individuals
(not including those in the grace period) the license class changes
expressed as a percentage of the total number of licenses from Feb 22
2007 to Nov 25 2007 are as follows:

Novice: decreased from 3.5% to 3.2% - loss of 0.3%
Technician: decreased from 44.8% to 44.7% - loss of 0.1%
Technician Plus: decreased from 4.7% to 3.3% - loss of 1.4%
General: increased from 19.9% to 21.7% - gain of 1.8%
Advanced: decreased from 10.5% to 10.0% - loss of 0.5%
Extra: increased from 16.5% to 17.1% - gain of 0.6%

Combined Tech/Tech Plus: decreased from 49.5% to 48.0% - loss of 1.5%.

Since no new Novice, Tech Plus or Advanced licenses have been issued
since April 2007, their declines due to attrition, upgrading and the
renewal of all Tech Plus as Technician are to be expected. Note that
none of the license classes experienced a change of more than 1.8%,
and most experienced changes of less than 0.7%.

73 de Jim, N2EY

wrote in news:bee3b054-8d1d-4ea1-9361-d31412aa1b41
@s36g2000prg.googlegroups.com:

That is a 0.1% growth rate.

In short, nothing much has happened to numbers, no significant
changes either way.

IMHO, it is significant that the license numbers were slowly
decreasing from 2003 to 2007, and are now slowly increasing. The
growth may be slight but at least it is not a loss.

The decrease in license numbers at that time very well might have been due
to the uncertainty of the demise of element 1. I know several new hams
that waited for it to go away.

- 73 de Mike N3LI -

Michael Coslo posted on Wed, 5 Dec 2007 10:28:14 EST

Interesting numbers, Len

We have a continuation of the dropoff of (almost certainly) inactive
Hams. Not too surprising there, if a person subscribes to the idea that
a lot of folks who once used 2 meters as a sort of "pre cell phone cell
phone" had migrated over to cell phones to get their communication needs
taken care of.

I think that that will continue until around 2009-10.

Mike, I wasn't presupposing any reasons for individuals to let their
licenses expire. Expirations are expirations. There's no proof or
anything else that all or some majority expirations come from
Technician class (the ones that supposedly used 2m as a cell
phone substitute).

I used www.hamdata.com primarily because that website does sort
out new licensees and expirations from the huge singular daily amateur
radio license database available from the FCC. QRZ and some other
amateur-oriented websites do different sorting. The ARRL website
listing only has sorting by 'active' license status, class, and state
or
province, does not indicate 'new' nor expiration nor class changes nor
'other administrative changes.'

ALL of these amateur-oriented statistical data services come from
the SAME public database information. That database contains
enough sub-data fields to derive all kinds of sorting. Some of that
sorting would require temporary storage of past database information
to show changes. The ARRL sorting is perhaps the simplest kind
since it requires no storage of previous database information, taking
only the 'active' individuals licensees out and sorting them by
license
class and geographical locations.

The number that I think is most important is the new license numbers.
People are still getting licenses, and at a healthy rate.

Well, at a 0.1% growth rate over 9 months, 'healthy' would be a
rather subjective descriptor, wouldn't it? :-)

At least they are INCREASING what was a LOSS rate, not a growth.
In the year prior to 3 March 2007 the number of expirations was
29,096 versus newcomer total of 22,605. That's a negative delta of
6,487. The positive delta over 9 months since 3 March 2007 was
only 1,162 (20,901 newcomers v. 19,739 expirations).

Not having the exact statistical breakdown of any licensee numbers
insofar as 9 months prior to 3 March 2007, I simply used the One
Year prior available numbers and did simple arithmetic (multiply by
3/4) to find a comparative change of newcomer v. expirations. That
turned out to be 21,822 expirations v. 16,957 newcomers, still a
negative delta and a 4,865 average drop to total licensees in the
same 9 months. In probability and speculation, without the
elimination of the code test as ordered on 19 December 2006 (R&O
FCC 06-178), the total licensee numbers would still be decreasing.

What would be more indicative of 'health' might be a more detailed
sorting of public database information as to newcomers achieving
what class license as their first. As a part of that, it would be
nice
to see how many and from which class does a license class change
within some time period. That seems to me to be more indicative
of newcomers interest and the probable future of amateur radio in
the USA once normal human attrition has taken care of the rest of
us. If that probable future turns out to be different than what the
devotees of the 60s and 70s newcomers did, then it is just
different.
Such difference in perference would not be a 'moral flaw' of
newcomers despite what some boomer-generation-newcomer
licensees express now.

The future of USA amateur radio belongs to the newcomers of now.
I think that the relatively minor number of existing licensees who
ARE doing things for newcomers, such as Steve Bonine described
in another thread here, are an EXCELLENT example of what should
be done...positive steps, proactive steps to help, not hinder
newcomers.

73, Len AF6AY

AF6AY wrote:

The future of USA amateur radio belongs to the newcomers of now.
I think that the relatively minor number of existing licensees who
ARE doing things for newcomers, such as Steve Bonine described
in another thread here, are an EXCELLENT example of what should
be done...positive steps, proactive steps to help, not hinder
newcomers.

I appreciate the kind words, Len, but I think that we all need to
realize that the ham radio hobby as we know it is changing. Of course,
that's no different than at any time in the past, since ham radio today
is different in many respects than ham radio of previous generations.
Like any other technology-driven activity, things have changed and will
continue to change. Can you imagine how amazed someone from the
spark-gap era would be if they were transported into today's world with
its tiny multi-function DC-to-light transceivers? [And just as if to
underscore how common that technology has become, when I misspelled
"transceiver", my email client underlined it for me, and provided the
correct spelling.]

There is, however, an aspect of change these days that is different than
what the hobby has ever experienced, and it's related to the topic of
this thread. The reality is that during the next decades the number of
active ham radio operators is going to decrease. We can massage the
numbers and wring our hands, but there are two absolute facts that we
cannot change: (1) The ham population is aging, (2) The general
population is less interested in ham radio than before.

Perhaps some are unwilling to accept the second statement as a fact, but
I think you're deluding yourself if so. Historically, most recruits
into the hobby came from young folks, and this demographic is simply not
as fascinated by radio as in the past -- they have many alternatives
vying for their spare time. We are getting more middle-aged and retiree
recruits than ever before, but even this population has many potential
ways to spend their spare time and ham radio has to compete.

But the big item is the current age of the ham radio population and the
fact that the same forces that are competing for spare time in the
general population apply to already-licensed hams. Analysis of number
of hams licensed is valuable but it doesn't tell the whole story. How
many licensed hams have gone inactive? There's no way license numbers
can tell us, but there are other statistics that do shed a little light
on it. I'm thinking about things like the number of entries in
contests, or the number of voters in ARRL elections. The problem with
these statistics is that they measure only one very narrow segment of
the hobby, but at least they're not falling off significantly. Yet.

I apologize for rambling, but the point is that I believe that the
number of active hams will decline significantly sometime in the next
10-20 years. I base this on what I see at hamfests (the ones that
haven't already folded), club meetings, and on the air -- almost all the
active hams I run into are at least 50 years old, and many are 70-80
years old. These guys (yes, almost all are male) simply will not be
active hams in 10-20 years. The best of recruiting cannot balance this
single fact.

On the other hand, I'm not sure that there's anything specific to be
done based on a belief that the number of active hams will decline. Our
local club is considering going from monthly meetings to quarterly
meetings; I don't think that's a good idea but it's the sort of thing
that we may see more of in the years to come. Maybe if we recognize the
reality of a shrinking active-ham population, we can come up with
logical and realistic reactions.

73, Steve KB9X

On Dec 5, 9:13 pm, AF6AY wrote:

What would be more indicative of 'health' might be a more detailed
sorting of public database information as to newcomers achieving
what class license as their first.

How would that indicate the 'health' of amateur radio, Len?

Whenever multiple entry-level license classes have been offered in the
USA, most newcomers have usually chosen the license class or classes
that were easiest to earn. That way they could sample amateur radio
without a big investment of time and effort, and learn-by-doing.

Of course some newcomers have bypassed the easiest-to-get license
classes and started out as Generals, Advanceds or Extras. Nothing
wrong with that, but how is it a measure of the 'health' of amateur
radio?

Such difference in perference would not be a 'moral flaw' of
newcomers despite what some boomer-generation-newcomer
licensees express now.

What does that mean, Len? Of whom do you speak?

The future of USA amateur radio belongs to the newcomers of now.

But not just to the newcomers.

The future of USA amateur radio belongs to all who are interested and
active in amateur radio, regardless of age, experience, license class,
or their particular area of interest in amateur radio. Simply being a
long-time-licensed amateur does not make someone irrelevant to the
future of amateur radio.

I think that the relatively minor number of existing licensees who
ARE doing things for newcomers, such as Steve Bonine described
in another thread here, are an EXCELLENT example of what should
be done...positive steps, proactive steps to help, not hinder
newcomers.

I agree that KB9X has done and is doing good things. But I think the
number of "existing licensees who are doing things for newcomers"
isn't minor at all.

73 de Jim, N2EY

On Dec 5, 7:33 pm, Mike Coslo wrote:
wrote in news:bee3b054-8d1d-4ea1-9361-d31412aa1b41
@s36g2000prg.googlegroups.com:

IMHO, it is significant that the license numbers were slowly
decreasing from 2003 to 2007, and are now slowly increasing. The
growth may be slight but at least it is not a loss.

The decrease in license numbers at that time very well might have been due
to the uncertainty of the demise of element 1. I know several new hams
that waited for it to go away.

Interesting theory! I know at least one ham who waited for Element 1
to go away, too.

If there's the possibility that the "price" of something will drop in
the near future, "sales" of that item often drop as people decide to
wait and see.

The number of US hams rose from early 2000 to mid-2003, then began to
decline almost exactly when the ITU treaty changed.

But correlation is not causation. There are any number of possible
reasons for the changes, ranging from sunspot decline to economic
factors to inexpensive cell phones and broadband internet.

The big question is whether the growth will continue long-term.

73 de Jim, N2EY

Steve Bonine wrote in
:

AF6AY wrote:

The future of USA amateur radio belongs to the newcomers of now.
I think that the relatively minor number of existing licensees who
ARE doing things for newcomers, such as Steve Bonine described
in another thread here, are an EXCELLENT example of what should
be done...positive steps, proactive steps to help, not hinder
newcomers.

I appreciate the kind words, Len, but I think that we all need to
realize that the ham radio hobby as we know it is changing. Of
course, that's no different than at any time in the past, since ham
radio today is different in many respects than ham radio of previous
generations. Like any other technology-driven activity, things have
changed and will continue to change. Can you imagine how amazed
someone from the spark-gap era would be if they were transported into
today's world with its tiny multi-function DC-to-light transceivers?
[And just as if to underscore how common that technology has become,
when I misspelled "transceiver", my email client underlined it for me,
and provided the correct spelling.]

There is, however, an aspect of change these days that is different
than what the hobby has ever experienced, and it's related to the
topic of this thread. The reality is that during the next decades the
number of active ham radio operators is going to decrease. We can
massage the numbers and wring our hands, but there are two absolute
facts that we cannot change: (1) The ham population is aging, (2) The
general population is less interested in ham radio than before.

Perhaps some are unwilling to accept the second statement as a fact,
but I think you're deluding yourself if so. Historically, most
recruits
into the hobby came from young folks, and this demographic is simply
not as fascinated by radio as in the past -- they have many
alternatives vying for their spare time.

In my area in the past two months, we have picked up dozens of new
amateurs who are in their late teens/early 20's. That is a surge,
normally we pick up a few per month. But we have no problems with
expecting plenety of QCWA members 25 years from now.


We are getting more middle-aged and retiree
recruits than ever before, but even this population has many potential
ways to spend their spare time and ham radio has to compete.

We have been getting some oldsters too. The amount they spend per
capita is shocking at times, and their enthusiasm and willingness to
get involved is a great help.

The concept of the child getting their license is over rated IMO.
And these days and in this world, a child siomply could not get much
of the experience available. I remember when I was a young'un,
friends and mysel hiking up the hill to the fellow who had the cool
CB station with a tower and one of those directional three pronged
verticals on it. We spent hours with the gent, happy and safe.

These days if you are going to spend time with youth, you'd better
have a person with you and have passed one of the State Police
background investigations. An approved escort should be with the
child at all events.

I apologize for rambling, but the point is that I believe that the
number of active hams will decline significantly sometime in the next
10-20 years. I base this on what I see at hamfests (the ones that
haven't already folded), club meetings, and on the air -- almost all

I've been in the hamfest discussion, with older Hams, newer ones, and
I've come to the conclusion that a large part of the reason that
Hamfests go away is that they start too early and end WAY too early
also.

These days if you get to a Hamfest at 11:00 a.m. you might as well
forget even going. I've seen people starting the teardown process at
9:30.

Looking at getting to a Hamfest at say 6:30 a.m., there is a "circle of
opportunity" where a person decides just how early they are willing to
get up and travel. The closest decent sized Hamfests to here are
Timonium MD and Breezeshooters in Butler. Timonium is around 3 hours,
and Butler is a little over 2. So if I go to Timonium, I look forward to
getting up at 3 in the morning. Add an hour of sleep for Butler. THe
first couple years I was licensed, I would get up at that time - or more
likely just not go to sleep Saturday night.But I think hard about it now.
Those early start and end times severely limit the geography limits of
attendance.

On the other hand, I'm not sure that there's anything specific to be
done based on a belief that the number of active hams will decline.

Our local club is considering going from monthly meetings to
quarterly
meetings; I don't think that's a good idea but it's the sort of thing
that we may see more of in the years to come. Maybe if we recognize
the reality of a shrinking active-ham population, we can come up with
logical and realistic reactions.

Respectully, I'm not really sure that another opinion on this subject is
being unrealistic though.

We have been doing a 2 percent increase in the local ham population (not
counting that recent surge) when newcomers/attrition is factored in.
Club membership is up over 10 percent. (2006-07 stats)

I know that a lot of Hams are pessimistic about the future. We even have
a few club members who figure that the service will die out in a few
years, and have all kinds of reasons for that. A number of us decided
that we were going to prove them wrong, and at least for the moment we
are doing just that. We instituted a no wheedling and whining policy, a
welcoming attitude toward the new guys and gals, gentle encouragement to
upgrade, lots of social events - every other Saturday breakfasts,
Wednesday evening very informal dinners, every other Saturday club shack
get togethers, 4 big socials during the year. Contesting, trips to Ham
radio stores. Only problem is some of the XYL's are starting to complain
that their OM's need to spend a bit of time at home too. And we're all
having a blast.


- 73 de Mike N3LI -

Steve Bonine posted on Thu, 6 Dec 2007 10:17:51 EST:

I appreciate the kind words, Len, but I think that we all need to
realize that the ham radio hobby as we know it is changing. Of course,
that's no different than at any time in the past, since ham radio today
is different in many respects than ham radio of previous generations.
Like any other technology-driven activity, things have changed and will
continue to change. Can you imagine how amazed someone from the
spark-gap era would be if they were transported into today's world with
its tiny multi-function DC-to-light transceivers? [And just as if to
underscore how common that technology has become, when I misspelled
"transceiver", my email client underlined it for me, and provided the
correct spelling.]

Well, the comparison isn't limited to going all the way back to the
spark-gap transmitter era of the 1920s. Just compare it to the
amateur
radio equipment of 1957. Only the adaptations of commercial radio
done for the amateur radio market could accurately read to within
(maybe) a hundred cycles (think Collins Radio as the best example
then). SSB AM hadn't yet reached mainstream on HF and on-off keying
CW of chains of vacuum tubes were the order of the day. RTTY was rare
and packet unheard of, even the word 'data' hadn't become a generic to
embrace all the various 'digital' modes. In fact, 'digital' was
itself hardly used, limited to nerd-geek programmers of mainframe
computers. :-)

Personal computers just didn't exist as common items of communications
before 1970, just 37 years ago. The Bulletin Board Systems weren't
there except in planning by a very few in 1975, just 32 years ago.
BBSs were the precursor to the Internet and they flourished in the
decade of approximately 1982 to 1992, became
widely popular among personal computer hobbyists and devotees. The
Internet became public in 1991, just 16 years ago, and that changed
the fabric of society in the USA considerably more than personal radio
(including amateur) had ever done. Solid-state devices had an
enormous impact in almost all areas of electronics, including amateur
radio. I see that as a very positive impact on advancement
in all states of the electronics-radio art. A few still openly long
for the old ways when things were 'simpler.'

Tagline: "When I was young we whittled our own ICs out of wood!" :-)

There is, however, an aspect of change these days that is different than
what the hobby has ever experienced, and it's related to the topic of
this thread. The reality is that during the next decades the number of
active ham radio operators is going to decrease. We can massage the
numbers and wring our hands, but there are two absolute facts that we
cannot change: (1) The ham population is aging, (2) The general
population is less interested in ham radio than before.

Heh heh, pardon my chuckling...if I had said the same thing before
2007 (and I have) the reaction would have been severe on Usenet. :-)

Perhaps some are unwilling to accept the second statement as a fact, but
I think you're deluding yourself if so. Historically, most recruits
into the hobby came from young folks, and this demographic is simply not
as fascinated by radio as in the past -- they have many alternatives
vying for their spare time. We are getting more middle-aged and retiree
recruits than ever before, but even this population has many potential
ways to spend their spare time and ham radio has to compete.

I have to admit that my case is a rarity and don't put myself up as
any example to emulate. :-) I was already retired 9 years (at least
from regular hours) when I became an alleged 'beginner' in radio with
an amateur radio license. :-) [that was done on approximately the
51st anniversary of getting my first FCC license...which was done 4
years after I had entered military communications...:-)]

But the big item is the current age of the ham radio population and the
fact that the same forces that are competing for spare time in the
general population apply to already-licensed hams. Analysis of number
of hams licensed is valuable but it doesn't tell the whole story.

True enough, but such statistics are about the only thing available
and
are derived from public databases by the only agency that grants
amateur radio licenses in the USA.

How many licensed hams have gone inactive?

Careful, Steve, you can start a whole new argument on using 'active'
or
'inactive.' In the legal sense of licensing 'active' is used to
describe if
a licensee is within their 10-year grant term and has not entered the
2-
year grace period. To ordinary folk, the word 'active' is commonly
used
for someone who is engaged in some activity currently with only minor
pauses to do other things currently. 'Inactive' to ordinary folk
would
mean a rather full stoppage of an activity.

There's no way license numbers
can tell us, but there are other statistics that do shed a little light
on it. I'm thinking about things like the number of entries in
contests, or the number of voters in ARRL elections. The problem with
these statistics is that they measure only one very narrow segment of
the hobby, but at least they're not falling off significantly. Yet.

One might look to the market for amateur radio goods as a 'minor'
indicator also...and that would be in the number of visible
advertisements in the few amateur radio interest publications. Those
were already diminishing in 1990, 17 years ago. The appearance of
intense interest is kept alive in QST as an example, but that is a
membership magazine and sounding board for the ARRL. The size
and quality of the only real independent competitor in monthlies is
CQ and it has shrunk in the last two decades. Popular
Communications is an independent but it also caters to other radio
interests, not just amateur radio.

On the other hand, I'm not sure that there's anything specific to be
done based on a belief that the number of active hams will decline. Our
local club is considering going from monthly meetings to quarterly
meetings; I don't think that's a good idea but it's the sort of thing
that we may see more of in the years to come. Maybe if we recognize the
reality of a shrinking active-ham population, we can come up with
logical and realistic reactions.

My opinion is that I don't see any 'logical' or 'realistic' things to
come
out of these discussion forums. It's (to me) just a lot of personal
expression, a window into what different folk think. A lot of
commentary is based on what individuals want to see and such
want things to continue in ways they like personally. Their
'reactions' have, by lots of visible proof, been severely negative
to anyone proposing changes. :-) What I can see happening logically
and realistically is individuals (such as yourself) doing things on
an
active basis and looking ahead to a more realistic probable future
for the hobby. Trends have already begun and those show more
changes ahead.

Tagline: "Today is the tomorrow you worried about yesterday." :-)

73, Len AF6AY