Tattoos ... Unsavory or Main Stream?

Emerging from their often unsavoury reputation of the recent past, tattoos have gained increasing prominence in the past decade. Life magazine estimated in 1936 that 10 million Americans, or approximately 6% of the population had at least one tattoo. A Harris Poll, done in 2003, nearly triples those numbers and estimates that 16% of Americans now have one or more tattoos. According to a 2006 survey by the Pew Research Center, thirty-six percent of those ages 18 to 25, and 40 percent of those ages 26 to 40, have at least one tattoo.