Hogwarts Upkeep - How big is the community?

[joanne0012]

No: HPFGUIDX 36572

--- In HPforGrownups at y..., "pengolodh_sc" <pengolodh_sc at y...> wrote:

> If you assume from evidence in the books that the average 
> wizard/witch lives twice as long as the average muggle (a reasonable 
> assumption IMHO), you can extrapolate the ratio - basically the total 
> wizarding-population of the UK should be roughly twenty times as 
> large as the number of students at Hogwarts.  

Ah, yes. But that's where the plot thickens!  Please, let's not get back into the 
debate about the number of students at Hogwarts; this board and the Lexicon 
have exhausted that.  A further complication is that although wizards might 
naturally have the potential for a much longer lifespan, the higher death rate 
during Voldemort's reign might have diminished that 20x ratio.  But undoubtedly 
it's higher than the ratio of muggle adults to muggle-school students.