Harper’s Index

Percentage change since 1995 in the U.S. trade deficit with China, as a percentage of U.S. GDP: +202¹

Percentage change with all other countries: +147²

Amount the U.S. spends annually on imported toys: $23,631,000,000³

Amount spent by the next ten highest toy-importing nations combined: $21,729,000,000⁴

Average number of credit cards per U.S. household: 12.7⁵

Percentage of middle-class Americans who spent more than a third of their income on home ownership in 1975: 2.8⁶

Percentage in 2001: 13.5⁷

Number of homeless San Franciscans hired to be extras in a movie with Will Smith as a formerly homeless millionaire: 250⁸

Amount they were paid hourly: $8.62⁹

Average hourly wage made by drug-dealing foot soldiers in Chicago, according to a Columbia University study: $3.41¹⁰

Amount a foot soldier’s family is paid if he is killed: $5,000¹¹

Average number of New Orleanians killed by gunfire each month since 2000: 16¹²

Number of the 1,035 confirmed Hurricane Katrina‒related deaths that were caused by gunfire: 8¹³

Number of Cuba’s fourteen provinces that were directly hit by a Category 4 hurricane in July: 12¹⁴

Number of people that the Cuban government successfully evacuated to safety: 1,535,000¹⁵

Chances that one of the 126 Wal-Marts shut down by Hurricane Katrina reopened within ten days: 9 in 10¹⁶

Days after Katrina hit that the first strip club was reopened in New Orleans: 20 ¹⁷

Percentage of their income from “dollar dances” that its strippers are donating to relief efforts: 100¹⁸

Portion of British food aid for Katrina evacuees that still sits unused in an Arkansas warehouse: 7/10¹⁹

Percentage of British adults who are members of any of their country’s three major political parties: 1.2²⁰

Percentage who are members of the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds: 1.9²¹

Number of U.S. states with legally enforceable trust laws for pets: 30²²

Minimum number of insurgent attacks in Iraq since November 2003 using explosive-carrying dogs or donkeys: 6²³

Minimum number of U.S. generals in Iraq using private security companies for their personal security: 4²⁴

Date on which USAID launched an Internet campaign asking Americans to help pay for the Iraqi reconstruction: 9/9/05²⁵

Amount it had raised as of early October: $1,400²⁶

Number of U.S. soldiers who have posted photographs of dead Iraqis or Afghans on Nowthatsfuckedup.com: 32²⁷

Cost of the access to the site’s pornography that each soldier was given in exchange: $20²⁸

Number of Alabama state senators co-sponsoring a bill last summer to “protect” public displays of the Ten Commandments: 10²⁹

Number of them who could list the Commandments: 1³⁰

Estimated number of U.S. abortions that were prevented in 2000 through use of the morning-after pill: 51,000³¹

Price in South Africa next year of a latex vaginal insert that latches onto a rapist’s penis and requires surgical removal: 35¢³²

Amount a German company says it can save a cargo ship in annual fuel costs by outfitting it with a giant kite: $1,200,000³³

Amount weather-related disasters cost worldwide in 2004: $107,000,000,000³⁴

Percentage change since 1970 in the amount of the earth’s land stricken by severe drought: +100³⁵

Number of degrees Fahrenheit that temperatures in California’s wine country have risen since 1971: 1.6³⁶

Percentage change since then in the average alcohol content of the region’s wines: +18.4³⁷

Miles per hour of two low-flying Danish fighter jets in February when they startled a reindeer named Rudolph to death: 450³⁸

Amount his owner, a professional Santa, was paid by the Air Force in September to buy a new Rudolph: $5,000³⁹

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