Index Archive

Percentage who said President Barack Obama “wants the terrorists to win”

: 24

Percentage of Republican party leaders who say they would support a tax increase this year “under any circumstances”

: 4

Projected amount by which U.S. defense spending will rise next year under Obama’s “spending freeze”

: $30,569,000,000

Total unfunded retirement liabilities of U.S. state governments today

: $1,000,000,000,000

Percentage of health-care spending in India, China, and the United States, respectively, that is private

: 75, 59, 54

Average number of minutes that a private-practice doctor in India spends with a patient

: 3.5

Percentage of Republicans in a January survey who believed their state should secede from the Union

: 23

Percentage of them that were started during the past decade

: 46

Percentage who favor legalizing it for medical use

: 69

Percentage of TV meteorologists in a 2010 University of Texas survey who said they thought global warming was a “scam”

: 29

Percentage of Americans who say they trust their TV meteorologists’ opinions on global warming

: 56

Ratio of the number of Republicans in Congress who use Twitter to the number of Democrats who do

: 2:1

Minimum number of users on A-Space, the U.S. intelligence community’s online social network

: 14,000

Number of members in WELCOM, the exclusive online social network of Davos attendees

: 5,000

Number of online subscribers to Newsday three months after the publication imposed a $5-per-week paywall

: 35

Number of grammatical errors found by a retired high school teacher in a single issue of The Miami Herald in January

: 133

Minimum weight, in pounds, of patrons who can eat free at the Heart Stoppers Sports Grill in Delray, Florida

: 350

Man-hours it took to build an entire stage set from Godiva chocolate for a February episode of The Oprah Winfrey Show

: 1,400

Minutes it took the audience to break it apart and take it home with them

: 30

Number of cannonballs used in the Battle of the Alamo currently owned by singer Phil Collins

: 18

Median age in 1982 of Americans who attended a jazz concert that year

: 29

Median age today of Americans who had

: 46

Percentage of U.S. seniors who favor legalizing marijuana for personal use

: 23

Percentage of Americans who support allowing “homosexuals” to serve in the military

: 59

Average portion of the teachers at government-run primary schools in India that is absent on any given workday

: 1/4

Percentage of its faculty a Rhode Island public high school fired in February due to poor student performance

: 100

Percentage of its 84 death-row inmates that Louisiana sued in January to block legal challenges to its execution procedures

: 100

Percentage change last year in U.S. bank robberies

: ???11

Number of U.S. states that tax the possession of illegal drugs

: 19

Amount that Kansas has assessed drug offenders in tax-evasion penalties under such a law

: $17,700,000

Percentage change in 2009 in the U.S. rate of violent crime

: ???4.4

Chances that an American believes crime went up last year

: 3 in 4

Number of active farmers’ markets in the United States

: 5,274

Percentage who support allowing “gay men and lesbians” to serve

: 70

Number of reported U.S. drone attacks in Pakistan since Obama’s inauguration

: 78

Number during George W. Bush’s entire presidency

: 45

Percentage change since 2007 in worldwide sales of surge protectors

: ???28

Estimated amount that 2007 regulations on power adapters have saved Americans in electricity costs

: $830,000,000

Average increase in cost for each new adapter

: $0

Projected change this year in the garbage-collection revenue of Berkeley, California, due to increased recycling

: ???$1,500,000

Harper’s Index

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