Portion of TSA funding that is spent on surface transportation : 1/50
Percentage by which U.S. railway fatalities outnumbered aviation fatalities last year : 78
Percentage change since 2014 in the number of U.S. railway workers who have tested positive for drug use : +43
Number of states in which it is legal to text while driving : 4
In which a texting ban has been shown to decrease accidents : 0
Portion of global traffic deaths that occur in low- or middle-income countries : 9/10
Number of U.S. states in which the poverty rate increased last year : 0
Factor by which a teacher in a “low-minority” school is more likely to be certified than one in a “high-minority” school : 4
Number of San Francisco homes for sale in September that were affordable on the average local teacher’s salary : 1
Rank of Colin Kaepernick, a black quarterback who protested the national anthem, among black Americans’ favorite NFL players : 5
Among white Americans’ least liked players : 1
Length, in miles, of a pipeline built in Bruges, Belgium, to funnel beer from a brewery to a bottling center : 2
Factor by which the extent of marine protected areas has increased since 2003 : 8.25
Percentage of the world’s oceans that remains unprotected : 96
Number of species that scientists have named after Barack Obama : 7
After the four previous U.S. presidents combined : 2
Estimated number of official local-government mascots in Japan : 4,000
Estimated number of North Koreans who are forced to work abroad in order to earn hard currency : 50,000
Average portion of their earnings they are allowed to keep : 1/3
Portion of Americans who have worked as independent contractors who would not do so again : 2/3
Portion of U.S. workers who believe strongly in their company’s values : 1/4
Percentage of Americans who turn first to Amazon.com when online shopping : 55
Number of employees Wells Fargo has fired since 2011 for signing up customers for accounts without their consent : 5,300
Chance that an actively managed U.S. mutual fund beat the market over the past year : 1 in 10
Number of successive years in which average out-of-network ATM fees in the United States have increased : 10
Amount the SEC awarded an ex-Monsanto employee in August for whistle-blowing about accounting practices : $22,437,800
Number of weeks in solitary confinement to which Chelsea Manning was sentenced after attempting suicide in July : 2
Number of U.S. states in which it is legal to sentence a minor to life in prison without parole : 31
Percentage of Americans who support the death penalty for convicted murderers : 49
Last year in which U.S. support for the death penalty was less than 50 percent : 1971
Number of countries that the United States bombed over a three-day period in September : 6
Percentage of direct U.S. military aid that will go to Israel next year : 54
Amount the State Department has distributed since July in Holocaust reparations to U.S. citizens : $9,688,500
Estimated total value of religious institutions in the United States : $1,200,000,000,000
Portion of Americans who believe that people can be supernaturally healed : 2/3
Who claim to have experienced such healing personally : 1/4
Percentage of users on Polygamy.com, a website that facilitates polygamous marriage, who are women : 55
Percentage change in Playboy’s newsstand sales since it excluded nudity in March : +28
In subscriptions : –23
Figures cited are the latest available as of October 2016.
“Harper’s Index” is a registered trademark.
December Index Sources
1 Transportation Security Administration (Arlington, Va.)
2 National Transportation Safety Board
3 Federal Railroad Administration
4,5 Insurance Institute for Highway Safety (Arlington, Va.)
6 World Health Organization (Geneva)
7 U.S. Census Bureau (Suitland, Md.)
8 Learning Policy Institute (Palo Alto, Calif.)
9 Redfin (Seattle)
10,11 E-Poll Market Research (Ventura, Calif.)
12 Halve Maan (Bruges, Belgium)
13,14 International Union for Conservation of Nature (Gland, Switzerland)
15,16 Harper’s research
17 Mitsubishi UFJ Research and Consulting (Tokyo)
18,19 Database Center for North Korean Human Rights (Seoul, South Korea)
20 Deloitte (Chicago)
21 Gallup (Omaha, Neb.)
22 BloomReach (Mountain View, Calif.)
23 Wells Fargo (Charlotte, N.C.)
24 S&P Dow Jones Indices (N.Y.C.)
25 Bankrate (N.Y.C.)
26 Meissner Associates (N.Y.C.)
27 American Civil Liberties Union (N.Y.C.)
28 The Sentencing Project (Washington)
29 Pew Research Center (Washington)
30 Gallup (Washington)
31 U.S. Department of Defense
32,33 U.S. Department of State
34 Brian J. Grim, Georgetown University (Washington)
35,36 Barna Group (N.Y.C.)
37 Polygamy.com (Dubai, United Arab Emirates)
38,39 Playboy Enterprises, Inc. (Beverly Hills, Calif.)
