8/86Chances that a family living below the poverty line in 1984 received no public-assistance payments: 2 in 3
10/88Portion of all land in downtown Los Angeles that is used for driving, parking, or servicing cars: 2/3
2/89Portion of all university funding for computer science research that comes from the Pentagon: 2/3
1/90Ratio of decisions handed down by the Supreme Court to decisions handed down by Judge Wapner, since 1980: 2:3
7/92Average portion of an American’s lifetime exposure to the sun that takes place before the age of 18: 2/3
8/92Chances that an American does not consider himself or herself a rock-music fan: 2 in 3
11/92Ratio of the number of West Bank housing units whose construction was suspended in July to those still being built: 2:3
11/92Chances that a professional football player will sustain a permanent injury before retiring: 2 in 3
Chances that a member of George Bush’s original cabinet was a lawyer: 1 in 5
6/93Ratio of U.S. aid pledged to Russia to U.S. spending on strategic nuclear weapons and defense systems next year: 2:3
8/93Chances that an adult resident of Los Angeles is white: 1 in 3
Chances that a voter in Los Angeles’s June mayoral election was white: 2 in 3
10/93Chances that an American adult under the age of 30 believes that Columbus “discovered America”: 2 in 3
Chances that an American over the age of 30 believes this: 1 in 2
10/93Chances that an Azerbaijani man has a mustache: 2 in 3
3/94Chances that an American opposes any cuts in defense spending: 2 in 3
Chances that a typical plan covers oral contraceptives: 1 in 3
11/94Ratio of spending on campaign ads by Bill Clinton in 1992 to total spending on all health-care-policy ads this year: 2:3
12/94Chances that a Santa Claus appearing in a mall this month has a college degree: 2 in 3
Chances that a Social Security recipient is: 1 in 100
7/95Chances that a fatal act of terrorism committed in the United States since 1982 was attributed to a domestic group: 2 in 3
7/95Chances that a minimum-wage earner is over the age of nineteen: 2 in 3
3/96Chances that an American woman whose cosmetic breast implants were removed in 1994 has since replaced them: 2 in 3
11/96Chances that a parliamentary candidate running last June on the “Contract with the Mongolian Voter” platform won: 2 in 3
8/97Portion of CIA documents to be declassified in 2000 for which the agency has requested exemption: 2/3
11/97Ratio of years by which Mir has outlived its life expectancy to years by which Boris Yeltsin has outlived his: 2:3
12/98Chances that a prostitute exhibits the symptoms of post-traumatic stress disorder: 2 in 3
1/99Chance that a Jewish Jerusalemite agrees that sovereignty over the city’s holy sites “ultimately belongs to God ”: 1 in 3
Chances that a Palestinian Jerusalemite believes this: 2 in 3
2/99Estimated chances that a U.S. corporate merger will result in short- and long-term shareholder losses: 2 in 3
5/99Chance that a mother of dependent children depicted on a prime-time network TV show holds a paying job: 1 in 3
7/99Maximum portion of buttocks that one may legally bare next year in Manatee County, Florida: 2/3
11/99Portion of the fifteen languages in which the Census Bureau will run ads this month that are Asian: 2/3
11/99Portion of the words in Webster’s New World Dictionary memorized by one non-English-speaking Thai Scrabble champ: 2/3
2/00Ratio of eToys’ 1999 net sales through last September to what it spent on marketing and advertising: 2:3
4/00Chance that a managed care patient is unaware of being enrolled in managed care: 2 in 3
1/01Ratio of Zambia’s foreign-debt payments in 1999 to what it is projected to pay this year under proposed debt relief: 2:3
11/01Ratio of New York bird deaths last summer attributed to West Nile virus to those attributed to pollution: 2:3
6/02Ratio of the number of Israelis and Palestinians killed in political violence last year to the number of Sri Lankans killed: 2:3
2/03Chances that a new student at the University of California at Berkeley last fall had at least one foreign-born parent: 2 in 3
3/04Chances that an American said three weeks after the Iraq invasion began that the U.S. casualty count was acceptable: 2 in 3
6/04Chances that God exists, according to a British physicist working as a risk analyst in Ohio: 2 in 3
3/05Chances that an FDA scientist lacks confidence in the agency’s ability to monitor the safety of current drugs: 2 in 3
1/06Portion of its currency reserves that Venezuela says it transferred from U.S. banks to Swiss banks last fall: 2/3
5/06Chances that an American believes that the U.S. will suffer a “major terrorist attack” by next March: 2 in 3
9/06Chance that an article in the top U.S. newsweeklies last year was about a Latino or Latinos: 1 in 100
Chances that an article about a Latino or Latinos was about immigration: 2 in 3
12/01Date on which the first contract for a book about September 11 was signed: 9/13
3/90Chances that a U.S. obstetrician has been sued at least once: 7 in 10
12/91Portion of eastern German gross annual product accounted for by government transfers from western Germany: 7/10
4/99Distance in miles between the Stanford dorm room of Chelsea Clinton and that of Carolyn Starr, daughter of Kenneth: 0.7
7/99Chances that an American adult can’t identify the source of the phrase “ life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness ”: 7 in 10
5/00Portion of Iran’s current population that was under the age of ten at the outset of the 1979 hostage crisis: 7/10
2/01Chances that a young black man living in Los Angeles’s Watts neighborhood is unemployed or in prison: 7 in 10
7/01Chances that an episode of The Simpsons contains at least one religious reference: 7 in 10
10/03Chances that farmed salmon contains PCB levels that are 4 times higher than those found in beef: 7 in 10
12/05Portion of British food aid for Katrina evacuees that still sits unused in an Arkansas warehouse: 7/10
6/07Chances that a large U.S. metropolitan area has seen its homicide rate increase since 2004: 7 in 10
8/07Portion of Americans who believe there are circumstances in which a medical patient should be allowed to die: 7/10
Portion who say they would consider ending their own lives if ill with a terminal disease: 1/3
11/07Chances that a new public-school teacher in Philadelphia will leave within six years: 7 in 10
5/08Portion of all Chinese cancer deaths that are pollution-related, according to the government: 7/10
11/08Chance that a U.S. conservative today believes church leaders should be involved in politics: 1 in 2
Chances in 2004: 7 in 10
4/02Chances that a country recently cited by the Pentagon as a potential U.S. nuclear target has no nuclear arms: 5 in 7
6/86Portion of the domestic TV market held by American manufacturers: 3/4
12/88Diameter of the earth if it were compressed to the density of a black hole, in inches: 3/4
10/89Portion of the trading on the Mexican stock exchange that consists of government-debt securities: 3/4
9/91Chances that a Democrat cannot name anyone “mentioned lately” as a 1992 Democratic presidential candidate: 3 in 4
10/91Chances that a Thai man has been to a prostitute: 3 in 4
1/93Chances that a Russian lives in an area in which air pollution exceeds official safety standards by five times: 3 in 4
3/93Chances that a Jew living in the former U.S.S.R. has applied for permission to emigrate to Israel since 1989: 3 in 4
4/93Ratio of the divorce rate in cities with a major-league baseball franchise to the rate in cities that are applying for one: 3:4
8/93Portion of all war fatalities in the last 500 years that took place in this century: 3/4
9/94Chances that a black federal judge appointed since 1977 was appointed by Bill Clinton: 3 in 4
10/94Chances that an arms sale made to a developing country last year was made by the United States: 3 in 4
12/94Chances that an American believes the federal government should take “primary responsibility” for eliminating poverty: 1 in 3
Chances that an American in 1964 believed the government had a responsibility to eliminate poverty: 3 in 4
11/95Chances that a hard-core rap album sold in the U.S. last year was purchased by a white person: 3 in 4
12/97Chances that a Chicago public school requires students to wear uniforms: 3 in 4
4/98Ratio of the average amount a U.S. family spent on food, clothing, and shelter last year to what it spent on taxes: 3:4
11/98Chances that a 1996 campaign contribution of over $200 came from a white man earning at least $100,000 a year: 2 in 3
Chances that a white male donor, making over $100,000 a year, and who gave over $200 to a 1996 campaign “personally knows” a member of Congress: 3 in 4
7/01Chances that a body of water in Mexico is too contaminated to swim in: 3 in 4
6/03Chance that a network-television advertisement is paid for by one of the 100 largest U.S. corporations: 3 in 4
11/03Percentage by which the Defense Department proposed cutting its budget this year by closing its Peacekeeping Institute: 0.001
Ratio of the institute’s budget to the estimated price of Jennifer Lopez’s engagement ring: 3:4
2/04Ratio of suicide bomb attacks carried out by Palestinians to those carried out by Sri Lanka’s Tamil Tigers since 1987: 3:4
2/05Chances of a U.S.”currency crisis” within five years, according to former Federal Reserve chief Paul Volcker: 3 in 4
3/05Ratio of the number of U.S. troops in Iraq to the number of Iraqi resisters, as estimated by Iraq’s new director of intelligence: 3:4
10/05Portion of L.A. County ’s black residents who would need to move in order for the city to be fully integrated: 3/4
6/06Chances that a U.S. federal judge has requested a government-supplied home security system since May 2005: 3 in 4
3/07Portion of female college students and graduates who say attending Spring Break results in “increased sexual activity”: 3/4
4/08Chances that a U.S. public school accepts advertising from corporations that sell junk food: 2 in 3
Chances that these schools wind up receiving no income from the advertisements: 3 in 4
9/08Chances that an American, asked to estimate what percentage of Americans are black, will guess too high: 3 in 4
11/08Chances that an Israeli Arab says he or she would rather live in Israel than anywhere else: 3 in 4
1/09Portion of Baghdad residents in 2007 who had a family member or friend wounded or killed since 2003: 3/4
1/09Portion of all U.S. income gains during the Bush Administration that have gone to the top 1 percent of earners: 3/4
12/88Chances that a presidential appointee has received no formal training for the job: 4 in 5
5/91Portion of Hallmark’s 1,200 different Mother’s Day cards that do not include the word “mother” or “mom”: 4/5
Chances today: 2 in 3
4/93Chances that a film winning the Academy Award for Best Picture was released in the second half of the year: 4 in 5
4/93Ratio of the number of thumbs up given last year by Gene Siskel to the number given by Roger Ebert: 4:5
5/93Chances that a retired Social Security recipient has received more in benefits than he or she contributed: 4 in 5
12/93Chances that the leader of a former Soviet republic is a former high-ranking Communist official: 4 in 5
3/94Chances that an admission to South-Central Los Angeles’s largest hospital will be through the emergency ward: 4 in 5
9/96Number of teachers for every hairstylist in Detroit: 0.8
10/96Chances that a copy of Newt Gingrich’s novel was returned to the publisher unsold: 4 in 5
1/98Ratio of estimated U.S. aid to Russia through the year 2000 to the amount of aid George Soros has pledged: 4:5
3/98Ratio of the duration of the sinking of the Titanic to the duration of last year’s film about the incident: 4:5
3/99Estimated chances that a U.S. child diagnosed with leukemia will be in remission five years later: 4 in 5
7/99Chances that a U.S. Catholic hospital does not provide emergency contraception to rape victims: 4 in 5
5/00Chances that a crib provided by a U.S. hotel or motel is deemed unsafe by the Consumer Products Safety Commission: 4 in 5
11/01Chances that a U.S. soldier in the Vietnam War volunteered: 4 in 5
Chance that a U.S. soldier in World War II did so: 1 in 3
12/02Chances that a child fed ”booger”-flavored jelly beans at a trade show this fall said they tasted like the real thing: 4 in 5
6/03Ratio of the top weekly fee paid a Munchkin in 1939’s The Wizard of Oz to the weekly fee paid for Toto: 4:5
6/04Chances that a sixth-grader at one Oklahoma City school was suspended for being disruptive during lunch last March 24: 4 in 5
8/04Ratio of the number of cicada eggs per square mile of southern New Jersey to the number of stars in the Milky Way: 4:5
5/07Chances that an American thinks the United States has a “mainly positive influence” on the world: 2 in 3
7/07Chances that a judge in a 2003 study deemed a taped confession to be voluntary if only the suspect appeared on camera: 4 in 5
Chances today: 4 in 5
12/07Portion of the world’s supply of morphine that is consumed in six of the world’s wealthiest countries: 4/5
7/96Chances that a cartoon in The New Yorker’s Women’s Issue was drawn by a man: 5 in 6
6/98Portion of all research time on government supercomputers granted in 1996 that went to military scientists: 1/2
Portion that will go to military scientists this year: 5/6
1/01Chance that the murder rate in a death-penalty state was lower in 1998 than the national average: 1 in 2
Chances that the rate in a state without the death penalty was lower than the national average: 5 in 6
8/01Ratio of the cancer rate on Puerto Rico’s main island to that on Vieques: 5:6
1/99Ratio of total U.S. disaster aid to Honduras last year to average annual U.S. military aid to Honduras in the 1980s: 6:7
11/99Ratio of the revenue Russia expects to collect this year to the revenue New York City collected: 7:8
2/95Ratio of the number of years actor Fred Grandy served in Congress to the number of years he appeared on Love Boat: 8:9
4/90Portion of all major domestic military bases that President Bush has proposed closing: 1/44
Portion of those the President has proposed closing that are in Democratic congresspersons’ districts: 9/10
8/90Chances that the level of pollution in a U.S. river has gotten worse or not improved since 1970: 9 in 10
12/90Portion of the 115 armed conflicts worldwide that are civil wars: 9/10
5/99Portion of the domestic oil-refining market that Standard Oil controlled prior to being broken up in 1911: 9/10
10/99Percentage change in domestic discretionary spending required through 2002 to fund Congress’s proposed tax cuts: -18
Portion of these tax cuts that will go to corporations: 9/10
10/99Chances that one of the ten bishop-approved Catholic exorcists practicing in the U.S. was approved since 1993: 9 in 10
1/00Chances that one of the 49 armed conflicts fought worldwide since 1990 relied exclusively on small arms: 9 in 10
3/02Chances that a movie released in the U.S. last year was pornographic: 9 in 10
1/03Chances that a U.S. House or Senate race last year was won by the candidate whose campaign spent the most: 9 in 10
4/05Chances that the divorce of a born-again Christian happened after he or she accepted Christ: 9 in 10
12/05Chances that one of the 126 Wal-Marts shut down by Hurricane Katrina reopened within ten days: 9 in 10
5/06Chances that an unprotected PC will become infected with a virus within an hour of being on the Internet: 9 in 10
4/07Chances that a U.S. institutional investor thinks that corporate executives are “dramatically overpaid”: 9 in 10
Chances that a director of a U.S. corporation does: 3 in 5
2/08Chances that an Israeli settlement in the West Bank has built beyond its official borders: 9 in 10
8/01Ratio of the starting salary of an Oklahoma prison guard to the federal poverty level for a family of four: 10:11