Finance & Economics News
Harper's Index for October 2005
Rank of 2004 among the most fiscally reckless years in U.S. history, according to the comptroller general: 1[U.S. Government Accountability Office]
Projected cost of disability payments to Iraq War veterans by 2050, based on rates for Gulf War veterans: $285,000,000,000[Linda Bilmes, Harvard University (Cambridge, Mass.)]
Number of “veterans of the global war on terrorism” that the VA budget assumed for 2005: 23,553[U.S. Senate Committee on Veterans' Affairs]
Estimated number today: 103,000[U.S. Senate Committee on Veterans' Affairs]
Age that the Pentagon in July proposed to set as the maximum for all new military recruits: 42[U.S. Department of Defense]
Number of sites in Iraq from which materials usable to make biological or chemical weapons are now “missing”: 118[U.N. Monitoring, Verification and Inspection Commission (N.Y.C.)]
Length, in yards, of U.S. snipers’ longest confirmed kill in Iraq: 1,050[Marine Corps News (Arlington, Va.)]
Portion of all U.S. foreign aid that goes to helping the recipients buy U.S.-produced weapons, equipment, or services: 1/4[U.S. Department of State]
Total U.S. spending on poppy eradication and other antidrug efforts in Afghanistan last year: $780,000,000[U.S. Department of State]
Amount it would have cost to purchase the country’s entire 2004 poppy crop: $600,000,000[U.N. Office on Drugs and Crime (Vienna)]
Percentage change since 2001 in the estimated value of all bribes paid to Russia’s government officials: +800[Indem Foundation (Moscow)]
Ratio last year of the estimated total bribes to the nation’s federal revenues: 5:2[Indem Foundation (Moscow)/Russian Ministry of Finance (Moscow)]
Estimated amount of African wealth held in foreign accounts, expressed as a percentage of African GDP: 172[U.N. Economic Commission for Africa (Addis Ababa, Ethiopia)]
Minutes that NBC and CBS spent covering the Darfur genocide last year: 8[Tyndall Report (N.Y.C.)]
Points a player earns for delivering a parcel of medicine, in the U.N. World Food Programme’s video game: 250[U.N. World Food Programme (Rome)]
Average estimated salary, in today’s dollars, of the dads on the ten top-rated TV shows of the 1950s: $77,000[Salary.com (Needham, Mass.)]
Average for the dads on today’s ten top-rated shows: $207,000[Salary.com (Needham, Mass.)]
Chance that a U.S. MBA obtained since 1980 was awarded to a woman: 1 in 3[U.S. Department of Education]
Chance that a corporate officer of a Fortune 500 company today is: 1 in 6[Catalyst (N.Y.C.)]
Percentage of patients hearing voices who hear a male voice, according to a British study: 71[Tony Nayani and Anthony David, Kings College Hospital (London)]
Percentage who hear an “upper-class” or “BBC” voice: 30[Tony Nayani and Anthony David, Kings College Hospital (London)]
Chances that a user of Pfizer’s new Parkinson’s disease drug will become a pathological gambler as a result: 3 in 200[Mayo Clinic (Rochester, Minn.)]
Percentage by which the average amount of anesthetic required by redheads exceeds the average for everyone: 19[Daniel I. Sessler and Edwin B. Liem, University of Louisville]
Chance that a medical study may be inaccurate or misleading, according to the AMA’s journal: 1 in 3[JAMA (Chicago)]
Months of vacation that President Bush has taken in five years: 11[Mark Knoller, CBS News (Washington)]
Days after the London attacks that Bush said the U.S. was at war abroad “so we do not have to face them here at home”: 4[The White House (Washington)]
Number of terrorist acts that one song by the Houston-based rapper Arabic Assassin describes him committing: 4[Harper's research]
Months he worked as a baggage screener at George Bush Intercontinental Airport before being fired in July: 6[Transportation Security Administration (Dallas)]
Minimum number of centuries in prison served by U.S. convicts for crimes of which DNA evidence later exonerated them: 19[Innocence Project (N.Y.C.)]
Number of U.S. states where bestiality is legal: 20[The Humane Society of the United States (Washington)]
Amount that Oakland residents can now be fined if their dog has not been implanted with an ID microchip: $100[City of Oakland Animal Services]
Years after the Watts riots that the Dr. Huey P. Newton Foundation trademarked “Burn Baby Burn” for a hot sauce: 40[U.S. Patent and Trademark Office (Alexandria, Va.)]
Portion of L.A. County’s black residents who would need to move in order for the city to be fully integrated: 3/4[United Way of Greater Los Angeles]
Months that a Louisiana state judge was suspended for wearing an Afro wig and blackface to a Halloween party last year: 6[Louisiana Supreme Court (New Orleans)]
Kernels of candy corn manufactured for Halloween each year: 9,000,000,000[National Confectioners Association (Vienna, Va.)]
Number of different stories offered for sale at any one time on a Dutch dial-a-fairytale service: 4[SprookieBel (Gorinchem, Netherlands)]
Price to listen to a seven-minute story: $1.70[SprookieBel (Gorinchem, Netherlands)]
Number of toilet seats at the EU Parliament building in Brussels that a TV station had tested for cocaine: 46[Institute for Biomedical and Pharmaceutical Research (Nuremberg)]
Number that tested positive: 41[Institute for Biomedical and Pharmaceutical Research (Nuremberg)]
Rank of 2004 among the most fiscally reckless years in U.S. history, according to the comptroller general: 1[U.S. Government Accountability Office]
Projected cost of disability payments to Iraq War veterans by 2050, based on rates for Gulf War veterans: $285,000,000,000[Linda Bilmes, Harvard University (Cambridge, Mass.)]
Number of “veterans of the global war on terrorism” that the VA budget assumed for 2005: 23,553[U.S. Senate Committee on Veterans' Affairs]
Estimated number today: 103,000[U.S. Senate Committee on Veterans' Affairs]
Age that the Pentagon in July proposed to set as the maximum for all new military recruits: 42[U.S. Department of Defense]
Number of sites in Iraq from which materials usable to make biological or chemical weapons are now “missing”: 118[U.N. Monitoring, Verification and Inspection Commission (N.Y.C.)]
Length, in yards, of U.S. snipers’ longest confirmed kill in Iraq: 1,050[Marine Corps News (Arlington, Va.)]
Portion of all U.S. foreign aid that goes to helping the recipients buy U.S.-produced weapons, equipment, or services: 1/4[U.S. Department of State]
Total U.S. spending on poppy eradication and other antidrug efforts in Afghanistan last year: $780,000,000[U.S. Department of State]
Amount it would have cost to purchase the country’s entire 2004 poppy crop: $600,000,000[U.N. Office on Drugs and Crime (Vienna)]
Percentage change since 2001 in the estimated value of all bribes paid to Russia’s government officials: +800[Indem Foundation (Moscow)]
Ratio last year of the estimated total bribes to the nation’s federal revenues: 5:2[Indem Foundation (Moscow)/Russian Ministry of Finance (Moscow)]
Estimated amount of African wealth held in foreign accounts, expressed as a percentage of African GDP: 172[U.N. Economic Commission for Africa (Addis Ababa, Ethiopia)]
Minutes that NBC and CBS spent covering the Darfur genocide last year: 8[Tyndall Report (N.Y.C.)]
Points a player earns for delivering a parcel of medicine, in the U.N. World Food Programme’s video game: 250[U.N. World Food Programme (Rome)]
Average estimated salary, in today’s dollars, of the dads on the ten top-rated TV shows of the 1950s: $77,000[Salary.com (Needham, Mass.)]
Average for the dads on today’s ten top-rated shows: $207,000[Salary.com (Needham, Mass.)]
Chance that a U.S. MBA obtained since 1980 was awarded to a woman: 1 in 3[U.S. Department of Education]
Chance that a corporate officer of a Fortune 500 company today is: 1 in 6[Catalyst (N.Y.C.)]
Percentage of patients hearing voices who hear a male voice, according to a British study: 71[Tony Nayani and Anthony David, Kings College Hospital (London)]
Percentage who hear an “upper-class” or “BBC” voice: 30[Tony Nayani and Anthony David, Kings College Hospital (London)]
Chances that a user of Pfizer’s new Parkinson’s disease drug will become a pathological gambler as a result: 3 in 200[Mayo Clinic (Rochester, Minn.)]
Percentage by which the average amount of anesthetic required by redheads exceeds the average for everyone: 19[Daniel I. Sessler and Edwin B. Liem, University of Louisville]
Chance that a medical study may be inaccurate or misleading, according to the AMA’s journal: 1 in 3[JAMA (Chicago)]
Months of vacation that President Bush has taken in five years: 11[Mark Knoller, CBS News (Washington)]
Days after the London attacks that Bush said the U.S. was at war abroad “so we do not have to face them here at home”: 4[The White House (Washington)]
Number of terrorist acts that one song by the Houston-based rapper Arabic Assassin describes him committing: 4[Harper's research]
Months he worked as a baggage screener at George Bush Intercontinental Airport before being fired in July: 6[Transportation Security Administration (Dallas)]
Minimum number of centuries in prison served by U.S. convicts for crimes of which DNA evidence later exonerated them: 19[Innocence Project (N.Y.C.)]
Number of U.S. states where bestiality is legal: 20[The Humane Society of the United States (Washington)]
Amount that Oakland residents can now be fined if their dog has not been implanted with an ID microchip: $100[City of Oakland Animal Services]
Years after the Watts riots that the Dr. Huey P. Newton Foundation trademarked “Burn Baby Burn” for a hot sauce: 40[U.S. Patent and Trademark Office (Alexandria, Va.)]
Portion of L.A. County’s black residents who would need to move in order for the city to be fully integrated: 3/4[United Way of Greater Los Angeles]
Months that a Louisiana state judge was suspended for wearing an Afro wig and blackface to a Halloween party last year: 6[Louisiana Supreme Court (New Orleans)]
Kernels of candy corn manufactured for Halloween each year: 9,000,000,000[National Confectioners Association (Vienna, Va.)]
Number of different stories offered for sale at any one time on a Dutch dial-a-fairytale service: 4[SprookieBel (Gorinchem, Netherlands)]
Price to listen to a seven-minute story: $1.70[SprookieBel (Gorinchem, Netherlands)]
Number of toilet seats at the EU Parliament building in Brussels that a TV station had tested for cocaine: 46[Institute for Biomedical and Pharmaceutical Research (Nuremberg)]
Number that tested positive: 41[Institute for Biomedical and Pharmaceutical Research (Nuremberg)]
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