10/06Portion of U.S. banking assets in 1996 that were controlled by the ten largest U.S. banks : 1/4 Portion today: 1/2
Portion today: 1/2
10/06Average salary package last year among all full-time employees of Goldman Sachs, including support staff: $521,000
10/06Chances of a recession in 2007, according to a chief economist of Merrill Lynch: 2 in 5
10/06Percentage change since 1999 in the number of consumer complaints about harassment by U.S. debt-collection agencies: +564
10/06Number of Americans whose past-due accounts the IRS will turn over to private debt collectors by 2008: 350,000
10/06Portion of the IRS’s staff of estate-tax auditors that the government plans to eliminate this year: 2/5
10/06Salary of the White House’s new Director for Lessons Learned: $106,641
10/06Factor by which the jobless rate among veterans under 25 of the Afghanistan and Iraq wars exceeds the U.S. average: 3
10/06Percentage change since 2004 in the number of Army recruits admitted despite records of “serious criminal misconduct”: +54
10/06Rank of the Lebanese government and Hezbollah, respectively, among Lebanon’s top employers: 1,2
10/06Days beforehand that Deep Purple had to cancel the July 27 Lebanon date on its “Rapture of the Deep” tour: 4
10/06Hours after the start of its war against Hezbollah that Israel’s army chief sold $32,000 of his stock holdings: 3
10/06Percentage of Americans in July who said the U.S. had “a responsibility to try to resolve” the Israeli-Arab conflict: 33
Percentage of Americans who think that the president has “a lot” of control over the price of gasoline: 63
10/06Number of the 66 U.S. senators favoring the anti-flag-burning amendment in June who signed up as its named sponsors: 59
10/06Minimum amount of USDA farm subsidies since 2000 that have been paid out to people who do not farm: $1,300,000,000
10/06Minimum value of “small business” contracts given out by the U.S. last year that went to Fortune 500 firms: $1,200,000,000
10/06Percentage of funds used to get Pennsylvania’s Green Party Senate candidate on the ballot that came from right-wingers: 100
10/06Number of U.S. coal-burning plants on which construction has begun or been completed since 2005: 153
10/06Energy, in megawatt hours, saved over thirty-five years by a bicycle rider who does not drive a car: 109
Portion of these savings that will be used up over the extra years the biker will live: 9/10
10/06Chances that a U.S. retiree says that he or she was forced to stop working earlier than planned: 2 in 5
10/06Estimated chance, according to new fossil research, that a Tyrannosaurus rex lived to full maturity: 1 in 50
10/06Ratio of the estimated number of tigers living in the wild to the number living as U.S. pets: 1:1
10/06Estimated amount that a farmed tiger could fetch if sold for parts, according to an Indian free-market think tank: $120,000
10/06Amount the Alaska Zoo paid last year to build a treadmill for its 8,000-pound elephant: $150,000
10/06Factor by which the number of attacks on U.S. forest rangers last year exceeded the number in 1995: 14
10/06Estimated amount that tourism will add to Rwanda’s economy next year: $26,000,000
10/06Estimated number of minutes of cocoa picking required to make a treat-sized Hershey chocolate bar: 1
10/06Percentage of volunteers in a four-year psychedelic-mushroom study who said they experienced “strong or extreme fear”: 31
Percentage who described the experience as “among the five most meaningful” in their lives: 67