Harper’s Index

Number of Americans, aside from Wen Ho Lee, who have ever been prosecuted under the 1948 Atomic Energy Act: 0¹

Number of Los Alamos documents Lee was accused of downloading that were classified at the time he did so: 0²

Days by which a Texan's prison sentence for candy-bar theft this year exceeded his sentence for marijuana possession: 550³

Number of families in a Texas town who have sued the school district over its adoption of random drug testing: 1⁴

Points by which the average SAT score of a home-schooled student exceeds that of other U.S. students: 81⁵

Percentage of U.S. public school teachers who hold a second job: 59⁶

Factor by which the Dow Jones Industrial Average increased between 1992 and 1998: 2.9⁷

Factor by which the annual number of cosmetic surgeries performed in the United States increased during that time: 2.5⁸

Percentage change since last May in the number of injuries caused by foot-powered scooters in the United States: +700⁹

Percentage of Americans killed by faulty auto parts in the 1990s who were killed by Firestone tires: 0.1¹⁰

Average annual number of traffic accidents in Iowa caused by low visibility due to corn stalks: 65¹¹

Inches by which Iowa's tallest corn stalks exceed the average height of an adult Asian elephant's eye: 17¹²

Number of people killed by captive elephants in the United States since 1983: 17¹³

Number of bears bred for their bile at China's 247 licensed bear farms in 1998: 6,764¹⁴

Rank of the China National Petroleum Corporation among companies with the largest stake in the Sudanese oil industry: 1¹⁵

Ratio of the average cost of a gallon of gas in Britain last September to that of a gallon of Starbucks coffee: 1:4¹⁶

Number of Russians electrocuted last year while trying to steal power lines and cable: 544¹⁷

Number of former Soviet republics whose per capita GDP was higher in 1997 than in 1990: 0¹⁸

Percentage change in the per capita GDP of Latin America between 1960 and 1980: +73¹⁹

Percentage change since then: +6²⁰

Percentage change since 1979 in the number of cocaine users in the United States: -62²¹

Chances that a Florida smoker lives in a household where smoking is prohibited: 2 in 5²²

Amount Anheuser-Busch contributed as a sponsor of the St. Louis presidential debate this year: $550,000²³

Minimum number of chromosomal regions proposed as sites for the tendency toward schizophrenia: 6²⁴

Year in which anxiety eclipsed depression among the most common mental-health problems in the United States: 1984²⁵

Percentage change in per capita U.S. sugar consumption since 1982: +28²⁶

Percentage change since 1990 in the number of adult Americans with diabetes: +33²⁷

Amount the Centers for Disease Control has spent redecorating a stairwell to encourage obese employees to walk: $14,900²⁸

Chance that a U.S. teenage boy has clogged coronary arteries: 1 in 31²⁹

Number of the six formerly inert elements whose inertia Finnish scientists have managed to disrupt: 4³⁰

Percentage of Americans who report being “regularly bored out of my mind”: 21³¹

Number of words for boredom in the Mohegan language, according to an ad for the Mohegan Sun Resort and Casino: 0³²

Number of Mohegan words that are a variant of “wampum,” meaning “spiritual reparation”: 3³³

Estimated number of hours of labor performed by African-American slaves between 1619 and 1865: 222,505,049³⁴

Estimated value of that labor, compounded at 6 percent interest through 1993: $97,100,000,000,000³⁵

Number of felons enlisted from an Ohio halfway house last July as extras in the Cincinnati Opera's production of Aida: 21³⁶

Number of Native Americans sought by a Pilgrim descendants' group this year to re-create the first Thanksgiving: 90³⁷

Price of a copulating turkey decoy, designed to flush fowl inflamed with territorial jealousy: $49.99³⁸

Hours after an Australian fisherman fell overboard in August that his head was found in the belly of a 98-pound cod: 21³⁹

Response: February 2001, page 90

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