May 2000 ·
Harper's index
·
Previous
·
Next
PDF |
Age by which Russian president Vladimir Putin tried to volunteer for the KGB: 151
Number of presidential decrees Putin issued within two months of taking office last December: 4912
Estimated percentage of people living in Russia's Ingushetia province last February who were Chechen war refugees: 573
Percentage increase in NATO troops required to seal Kosovo's border, according to a Pentagon official last March: 1504
Chance that a U.N. member country other than the U.S. or Israel did not vote for a 1999 ban on “an arms race in space”: 05
Number of days of Israeli bombing it took last winter to disable a Lebanon power grid for a year: 16
Portion of Iran's current population that was under the age of ten at the outset of the 1979 hostage crisis: 7/107
Ratio of the average price of oil in the fall of 1979 to the price last February: 1:18
Rank of the 47,000 acres of U.S. land sold to Occidental Petroleum in 1997 among the largest federal land sales ever: 19
Number of acres of Brazil's Panambizinho region that the country's government promised to return to its Indians in 1995: 3,06310
Number of acres returned so far: 011
Years before Indonesia hired Henry Kissinger last winter that he was the U.S. adviser on its invasion of East Timor: 23.512
Percentage by which India has announced that it will increase its military budget next year: 2813
Rank of Bangladesh and Poland among countries accounting for the largest number of U.N. peacekeepers deployed last fall: 2,114
Ratio of the number of people worldwide who are underfed to those who are overfed: 1:115
Percentage change since 1997 in direct government payments to U.S. farmers: +20016
Percentage change since then in total farm income, government payments included: -117
Average amount of revenue per acre generated by a U.S. farm of fewer than ten acres: $1,902.5018
Average revenue per acre generated by a farm of more than 2,000 acres: $21.4019
Ratio of U.S. corn exports to Europe last year to such exports in 1996: 1:22020
Factor by which a shipment of Ukrainian mushrooms seized by French customs last year exceeded legal radiation limits: 1221
Percentage of all aquatic life in a Danube tributary killed last winter when a mine's tailings dam overflowed: 9522
Percentage change since 1988 in the amount of seafood eaten worldwide that is cultivated rather than caught: +14623
Chance that a U.S. fisherman died on the job in 1998: 1 in 71824
Chance that a U.S. police officer did: 1 in 4,61325
Rank of traffic accidents among the leading causes of death for on-duty U.S. police officers last year: 126
Chance that a police officer in South Africa is not licensed to drive: 1 in 1027
Price of an AK-47 on Uganda's black market, in chickens: 128
Number of endangered tortoises that U.S. Customs agents discovered in a man's trousers last December in Miami: 5529
Price of a sautéed lobster gilded with 24-carat gold at Boston's Biba restaurant last New Year's Eve: $4430
Price of a night in Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center's “special suite” equipped with antiques and a living room: $2,80031
Chances that a crib provided by a U.S. hotel or motel is deemed unsafe by the Consumer Products Safety Commission: 4 in 532
Estimated number of American men who suffer from compulsive bodybuilding: 669,00033
Points by which the percentage of U.S. college students who are “frequent binge drinkers” has changed since 1993: +334
Points by which the percentage who are abstainers has changed: +435
Chance that a college student expects to be a millionaire by the age of 40: 1 in 236
Percentage of Americans earning $50,000 or less who have watched Who Wants to Be a Millionaire: 5737
Percentage earning at least $75,000 who have watched it: 8138
Number of TV game shows hosted by Mike Wallace before beginning his full-time journalism career: 739
Ratio of the number of hotel rooms planned for Las Vegas's Venetian Hotel to all the hotel rooms in Venice: 1:140
| |
| SEE ALSO: Agriculture; Animal; Bangladesh; Brazil; Death; Diet; Disease; Drugs; Education; Energy; Europe; Fashion; Folly; Food; France; Kissinger, Henry; India; Indonesia; Iran; Israel; Italy; Kosovo; Massachusetts; The Media; Mendacity; NATO; Nevada; Oil; Parenting; U.S. Department of Defense; Poland; Policing; Russia; South Africa; Space; Sport; Television; Transportation; Uganda; Ukraine; United Nations; Putin, Vladimir; War | |
| Previous · Next |
| December 2009 THE GENERAL ELECTRIC SUPERFRAUD
THE MASTER OF SPIN BOLDAK
MERMAID FEVER
UNDERSTANDING OBAMACARE
Also: Dave Hickey and Wendell Berry |