Data in the News

Unemployment Rises While Output Falls in Greece

2012-02-13T10:18:00.001-05:00

In a recent Wall Street Journal article, Alkman Granitsas discusses Greece’s unemployment rate for November 2011, which was released Thursday. The November unemployment rate was 20.9%, which is up from 18.2% in October 2011. The graph from the article shows the steady climb in Greek unemployment since 2010, when unemployment was below 15%. As the graph also shows, this rise in unemployment has coincided with a fall in industrial output of 7.8% from November to December. Granitsas points to last year’s austerity measures as a likely contributor to the economic slowdown that has resulted in a fifth year of recession for Greece.

LinkedIn Exceeds Wall Street's Expectations with Strong Quarterly Showing

2012-02-13T07:00:00.000-05:00

A Reuters article noted LinkedIn's strong showing in the fourth quarter of this past year, when its revenue of $167.7 million exceeded Wall Street's expected $159.7 million. At the same time a year earlier, revenue for the fourth quarter only totaled $81.7 million. And more money is expected to trickle in; the company, which went public in May, set a revenue estimate for 2012 in the range of $840 million to $860 million. Expectations were also strong outside the company: "Average Street estimates for the full year 2012 were $828.2 million in revenue."

Reuters credits the company's increased revenue "to strong product and subscription growth."

Looking for a Job? Try North Dakota

2012-02-10T12:00:00.000-05:00

A recent Gallup survey shows that more employers in North Dakota were hiring rather than firing workers, and by a significant margin. This landed North Dakota a +34 score on Gallup’s Job Creation Index, with the District of Columbia trailing behind in second place with a +24 score. Rhode Island received the lowest score with a +4 and New Jersey placed second to last with +6. Though North Dakota may have the best job creation, Nevada appears to be making a turn around and had the strongest improvement in job creation. Michigan also improved significantly, adding 8 points to its job creation index in the past year.

Steve Jobs: The Most Underpaid CEO?

2012-02-10T07:00:00.000-05:00

A debate has been growing regarding executive pay and performance. While many financial-research companies, such as Oberatt, hold that pay should be correlated with performance, this is often not the case. For many companies in the S&P 100, the performance of the company does not necessarily impact the pay of the CEO. Obermatt, by calculating and comparing the profit and shareholder returns of companies, has compiled a list of the "most over- and underpaid" CEOs. Among the list of the most overpaid were Hewlett-Packard’s CEO, Mark Hurd and Ray Irani, the CEO of Occidental Petroleum. Steve Jobs was listed as the most underpaid CEO with Eric Schmidt of Google coming in a distant second.

And the Winner for Highest Tax Rate Goes to…

2012-02-09T12:00:00.000-05:00

Despite the lively debate surrounding our current tax code, the tax rate on incomes of $100,000 in the United States is quite low compared to countries in Europe and Asia. While Denmark may take the prize for the highest tax rate for incomes of $100,000, it only taxes 0.2% for social-security contributions. Taking into account all of these factors, Belgium actually gets the most out of its $100,000 earners, taking a cut of about 48%. Also, as the Economist explains, despite the fact that tax rates for personal income were on the decline between 2003 and 2009, many governments have raised taxes in an effort to combat serious deficits.

Job Openings Up in December

2012-02-09T07:00:00.000-05:00

According to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS), there were 3.4 million job openings on the last business day of December, an increase of "39 percent since the end of the recession in June 2009." This also signals an increase since the end of November, when the number of job openings totaled 3.1 million. The BLS Editor's Desk notes, "The job openings rate—2.5 percent in December—has trended upward since the end of the recession in June 2009, when the job openings rate was 1.8 percent."

Teenage Pregnancy Rate on the Decline

2012-02-09T01:00:00.000-05:00

Data recently released by the Economist shows that the teenage pregnancy rate is on the decline, from almost 12% at the high of the 90’s, to 7%. While the pregnancy rate has declined for White, African American, and Hispanic teenage girls 15-19 years old, black and Hispanic teenagers are still more likely to get pregnant. The abortion rate has also declined, though it still remains higher for black teenagers.

Getting Rich, Fast

2012-02-08T12:00:00.000-05:00

The Economist's daily chart shows that, adjusted for age, and "assuming that Facebook's recently announced share offering is valued at $100 billion," Mark Zuckerberg will become "the richest man in the world." By net worth, Mr. Zuckerberg would score "ninth in last year's rankings." But "at 27, he is the youngest of the plutocrats by a considerable margin."

Computation Error Explains Census Bureau's Incorrect Estimate of Mortality Rate

2012-02-08T08:00:00.000-05:00

Researchers Leonid A. Gavrilov and Natalia S. Gavrilova of the National Opinion Research Center (NORC) at the University of Chicago found that a computation error was to blame for the U.S. Census Bureau's incorrect prediction six years ago that "that there would be 114,000 centenarians in the country by 2010 when the actual number turned out to be half that at 53,364." The researchers' work "contradict[s] a long-held belief that the mortality rate of Americans flattens out after age 80."

Instead, it appears that "Gompertz Law, named for Benjamin Gompertz, who observed in 1825 that a person's risk of death in a given year doubles every eight years of age...holds at least through age 106, and probably higher, but the researchers said mortality data for those older than 106 is unreliable."

Asset Performance: the Winners and Losers

2012-02-06T08:00:00.000-05:00

The Economist recently published data focusing on the asset performance of bonds, equities, and precious metals. Although many sectors of the world economy have taken hits, government bonds and gold have fared well. As The Economist explains, this is likely because many people view these assets as "stores of value", or safe investments. However, not all government bonds have thrived during this time. Greece bonds had the lowest returns, with EU Carbon credits coming in second and Egypt equities in a distant third.

Facebook Files for I.P.O.

2012-02-04T10:00:00.000-05:00

On February 1, Facebook filed for an I.P.O. (Initial Public Offering), taking the first measure towards becoming a publicly traded company. Facebook is aiming to raise $5 billion from its I.P.O., which, according to The Economist, would give it market capitalization (total value of tradable shares) similar to that of McDonald's. Mark Zuckerberg, Facebook's founder and CEO, owns 28% of the company, which will be worth approximately $28 billion. Facebook's high value is due in large part to its ability to target individuals with advertisements which pertain to their particular interests.

Union Membership in 2011

2012-02-03T07:00:00.000-05:00

The U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) recently released a report on union membership in 2011, and how the membership rate compares across regions and industries. The Editor's Desk summarized some of the findings and provided visuals. Some findings of note:

-"The union membership rate for public-sector workers (37.0 percent) was substantially higher than the rate for private-sector workers (6.9 percent)."

-"Within the public sector, local government workers had the highest union membership rate, 43.2 percent."

-"In 2011, 29 states and the District of Columbia had union membership rates below that of the U.S. average, 11.8 percent, while 21 states had higher rates. All states in the Middle Atlantic and Pacific divisions reported union membership rates above the national average, while all states in the East South Central and West South Central divisions had rates below it."

Youth Unemployment in Europe Is "Scary"

2012-02-02T10:00:00.000-05:00

Zero Hedge, a US financial blog, included what it referred to as “Europe’s Scariest Chart” in a post Tuesday. Rather than European debt or bond prices, as one may expect, the chart shows the unemployment rate of those 16-24 year-olds in Spain, Greece, Portugal and the entire Euro Zone. As the chart shows, the youth unemployment rates increased sharply for Spain and Greece in 2008 and have continued to climb rapidly while that of Portugal and the Euro-Zone as a whole remained comparatively stable. Currently, youth unemployment is highest in Spain and Greece at 51.4% and 46.6% respectively. That of Portugal and the Euro-Zone is quite a bit lower at 30.7% and around 20% respectively. This chart is the “scariest” because, according to Zero Hedge, “the last thing Europe needs is a discontented, disenfranchised, and devoid of hope youth roving the streets with nothing to do.”

Deadline Alert for ICPSR Summer Undergraduate Internship

2012-02-01T08:33:00.000-05:00

The deadline for the ICPSR Summer Undergraduate Internship is Monday, February 13, 2012. For more information or to apply, see http://www.icpsr.umich.edu/icpsrweb/content/ICPSR/internship/

Median Weekly Earnings by Age, Race and Ethnicity, Sex

2012-01-31T07:00:00.000-05:00

The Editor's Desk, a publication from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS), summarized a report on weekly earnings of wage and salary workers in the fourth quarter of 2011. The size of the gap between men and women in median weekly earnings varied by age, race and ethnicity, but at every level, men out-earned women.

Economic Desperation Breeding More Ponzi Schemes?

2012-01-30T12:00:00.000-05:00

The Economist's daily chart highlights the growing number of exposed--and investigated--Ponzi and fraud schemes in the U.S., and the magazine suggests that the weak economy may be the cause. It writes that "lean economic times...make get-rich-quick schemes more tempting, and desperation breeds gullibility." And those schemes that do exist are often more easily exposed during tough economic times, "when it becomes clear who has been swimming naked."

Debunking Myths About Food Stamps

2012-01-30T07:00:00.000-05:00

In a recent article, the Chicago Tribune aimed to debunk popular misconceptions about trends in welfare spending and the welfare recipient population, issues that "the Republican presidential race has brought...to the forefront." Reporter Dawn Turner Trice wrote, "When it comes to welfare, perceptions have often trumped reality."

The article provides fact-based commentary on political strategies regarding welfare, including the following:

"Though blacks are disproportionately represented among food stamp recipients, far more whites receive such assistance. When recipients identified themselves by race in 2010, 34 percent were white, 22 percent were black and 16 were percent Hispanic, the Agriculture Department said."

"Food-stamp spending has indeed increased under Obama, but its steady climb began under President George W. Bush."

"The Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, a nonpartisan think tank, said anti-poverty programs make up about 20 percent of the federal budget, and that's been true over the last three decades when both Republicans and Democrats have been in power."

"Among the big social safety net expenditures in 2011 are Medicaid ($274 billion) and refundable tax credits, including the earned income tax credit ($102 billion). Food stamps ($71.8 billion) and cash assistance ($6.9 billion) constitute just 2.2 percent of the federal budget, but they pack a bigger wallop when it comes to public perceptions."

The article also quotes Michael Dawson, director of the Center for the Study of Race, Politics and Culture at the University of Chicago, regarding Republican efforts--specifically, those of Newt Gingrich--to bring up welfare as an issue, as saying: "It's a tired tactic but one that's sometimes effective in mobilizing white racial resentment."

Cultural Inequality in the U.S.

2012-01-27T09:00:00.000-05:00

In a recent Wall Street Journal article, Charles Murray discusses the emergence of what he refers to as “cultural inequality” in the U.S. since the 1960s. According to Murray, this cultural inequality is a result of the formation of a “new upper class” and “new lower class” that no longer share an “American way of life.” Among the qualities that Murray uses to define this so-called American way of life are marriage, male employment, religion and marital births. The interactive graphic from the article shows statistics relating to all of these items for people aged 30-49 that are defined as upper middle class (“with at least a college education working in managerial jobs or high-status professions”) and working class (“with no more than a high school education in blue-collar, low-skill or service jobs”) from the 1960s/1970s and the 2000s. The data seem to support Murray's concept of a new cultural inequality in the US, as more members of the working class appear to have fallen away from the “American way of life” than members of the upper middle class over the last 4 or 5 decades. For example, while the marital rate of the upper middle class have fallen from 94% to 83% since 1960, the marital rate of the working class plummeted from 84% to 48% over the same time period. A similar trend can be seen in the rest of the graphic, with the working class experiencing a larger percentage increase in males with jobs working fewer than 40 hours per week and a larger percentage increase in those calling themselves non-religious.

Last call for ICPSR Research Paper Competition entries!

2012-01-27T08:50:00.000-05:00

The deadline for the ICPSR Research Paper Competition for undergraduate and graduate students is this coming Tuesday, January 31. For prizes, forms, and details, see http://www.icpsr.umich.edu/icpsrweb/content/ICPSR/prize/index.html

Causes of Stress in Regions of the U.S.

2012-01-26T10:00:00.000-05:00

The American Psychological Association recently released the 2011 results of their annual nationwide survey, “Stress in America.” One portion of the report discusses the causes of “somewhat/very significant” levels of stress reported in each region of the United States in which those surveyed were asked to indicate the level of stress each of the listed sources of stress caused in their lives. Overall, money, work, and the economy were the largest causes of stress with 75%, 70% and 67% reporting that each respective factor was a cause of “somewhat/very significant” levels of stress. Among the four regions, those on the East Coast reported the most stress caused by money (80%), work (74%), and relationships (66%). Those in the Midwest reported the most stress caused by the economy (72%) and personal health concerns (59%). Southerners, on the other hand, reported the most stress from family responsibilities (62%) and health problems affecting family members (65%). Westerners reported the lowest amount of stress caused by everything except for work, where it reported slightly more stress than those in the South (69% and 67% respectively).

U.S. Projected to Decrease Foreign Oil Dependence

2012-01-25T12:06:00.000-05:00

On Monday, the U.S. Energy Information Administrationreleased the Annual Energy Outlook 2012 Early Release. This report provides projections for the U.S.energy markets under the assumption that current energy laws and regulationsstay fairly unchanged. This informationcan be used to discuss the current state and trends of the energy market forthe ultimate goal of analyzing and identifying necessary changes in energypolicies, rules, and regulations moving forward.

The AEO report presented a projected decrease in dependenceon foreign oil in the United States. Figure 1 from the AEO is shown below and illustrates the anticipated closinggap between U.S. fuel consumption and domestic fuel supply. At its peak in 2005, 60% of fuel consumed inthe U.S. was imported. This percentagedecreased to 49% in 2010, and the EIA believes this trend will continue until2035 when foreign fuel will constitute only 36% of fuel consumed in the United States. This trend is due to increased domestic fuel supplyfrom growth in domestic oil production as well as limited increases inconsumption due to increased use of biofuels, moderate growth in thetransportation industry’s demands, and higher fuel economy standards invehicles.

A Look at the Top 1% Shows Shift to Finance, Stability Within its Ranks and High Political Engagement

2012-01-21T16:09:00.000-05:00

The Economist took a look at the top one percent and "the changing complexion of America’s rich." It highlighted Mitt Romney as a reflection of this change, because "the wealthiest 1% of Americans not only get more of the pie," but also because "they are increasingly creatures of finance." There have been wealthy presidential candidates before, but Romney represents "the first candidate from the world of high-octane finance."

The Economist writes of the shift to finance, "According to an analysis of tax returns by Jon Bakija of Williams College and two others, 16% of the top 1% were in medical professions and 8% were lawyers: shares that have changed little between 1979 and 2005, the latest year the authors examined (see chart). The most striking shift has been the growth of financial occupations, from just under 8% of the wealthy in 1979 to 13.9% in 2005. Their representation within the top 0.1% is even more pronounced: 18%, up from 11% in 1979." A graphic from the New York Times also focuses on the occupational distribution of the top one percent.

Also indicative of the shift to finance, it appears that the wealthiest of the wealthy are now employed in financial occupations, a change from years past. "[Steve] Kaplan [of the University of Chicago] and Joshua Rauh of Northwestern University note that investment bankers, corporate lawyers, hedge-fund and private-equity managers have displaced corporate executives at the top of the income ladder. In 2009 the richest 25 hedge-fund investors earned more than $25 billion, roughly six times as much as all the chief executives of companies in the S&P 500 stock index combined."

What does a household in the top one percent make? "The average household income of the 1% was $1.2m in 2008, according to federal tax data." But The Economist notes, "The ultra-rich skew that average upwards: admission to the 1% began at $380,000 in 2008." Of course, income is not the only measurement of wealth: "Measured by net worth, rather than income, the top 1% started at $6.9m in 2009, according to the Federal Reserve, down 23% from 2007."

The Economist cites Mr. Kaplan, who argues that the move to finance largely accounts for the growth in the wealth gap. "Updating a series developed by Thomas Piketty and Emmanuel Saez, Mr Kaplan notes that the share of income going to the 1% reached an 80-year high of 23.5% in 2007, only to sink to 17.6% in 2009 as the financial markets deflated (see chart). The trend is even more pronounced for the top 0.1%, whose share of total income rose to 12.3% in 2007 but sank to a still disproportionate 8.1% in 2009."

Research indicates that inequality in the U.S., as measured by the share of total income that goes to the top one percent of earners, has grown faster than in other countries. The Economist surmises that among other factors, this development could be resulting from "the relatively large role of the financial sector in English-speaking countries...[as] even more of the top 1% work in finance in Britain than in America."

Chances are that if you are born wealthy, you are likely to retain your wealth as an adult: "Membership in America’s 1% is relatively stable; three-quarters of the households in the percentile one year will still be there the next. Although the proportion shrinks over time, one study found that the vast majority of the top 1% were still in the richest 10% a decade later." The reason for this is fairly straight-forward: "rich parents tend to produce rich kids." Their children go to college and graduate institutions at a disproportionately high rate; "According to Gallup, 72% of the 1% have a college degree, and half have a postgraduate degree; those are two to three times the proportion of the other 99%." Numbers also indicate, "The 1% are more likely to be married and to have children."

And if you're born wealthy, it's likely that you'll marry someone from a similar economic background. "The rich also increasingly marry people like themselves. Mr Bakija and his co-authors found that between 1979 and 2005, the share of spouses of the 1% who had blue-collar or 'miscellaneous' service-sector backgrounds declined slightly, from 7.9% to 6.4%. The share of spouses who worked in finance, property and law rose from 3.5% to 8.8%."

Individuals in the top one percent are likely to be politically active, and although their political preferences are somewhat "eclectic," they tend to lean toward the Republican party. "Politically, Gallup polls find that the 1% are more likely than the 99% to identify themselves as Republicans (33% to 28%) and less likely to be Democrats (26% to 33%)." They rate the budget deficit as their central concern, and unemployment as their second; the other 99 percent of Americans prioritize these concerns in the reverse order.

The Economist writes that individuals in the top one percent "are far more politically engaged than the average 99-percenters," citing a study which showed that "68% make campaign contributions, nearly half had contacted a member of Congress and a fifth had solicited contributions on behalf of a candidate."

How would individuals in the top one percent describe themselves? Often, it is difficult to locate an answer: "Most of the 1% prefer not to talk about their good fortune."

Negative Press Coverage Plagues Front-Runner Romney

2012-01-20T12:47:00.000-05:00

According to the Pew Center's Project for Excellence in Journalism, Mitt Romney is receiving more negative press coverage than at any other point in the GOP race. Romney, who won the Iowa caucus and New Hampshire primary, will compete against remaining GOP candidates in South Carolina's primary on Saturday.

According to Pew's analysis, this increase in negative coverage for Romney may reflect opponents' efforts to attack the current frontrunner through negative advertisements. In particular, negative discourse regarding Romney revolved around his career at Bain Capital. According to an article on the Politics and Government Blog of the New York Times, GOP candidate opponent Newt Gingrich described Romney's work at Bain as "rich people figuring out clever legal ways to loot a company."

According to the same report, Ron Paul is currently receiving more positive coverage than any other candidate. Almost half of the coverage of Ron Paul over the past week has been positive; according to the report, Paul has been described in many press accounts as "having little chance of winning the nomination."

Of all GOP candidates, Rick Perry currently is criticized the most, with his negative coverage nearly double his positive coverage. Coverage of President Obama from January 9, 2012 to January, 15, 2012 included fewer positive mentions than any of the GOP candidates. Only 10% of coverage regarding Obama was positive. These data come from an analysis of more than 11,000 news websites and mentions on Twitter.

New Paper Finds Global Abortion Rate Stalling

2012-01-20T08:00:00.000-05:00

The Economist's daily chart yesterday focused on a recent paper from The Lancet that "estimate[s] the number of safe and unsafe abortions in 2008." Because some countries under-report abortions, tracking them is not a simple task. Perhaps for this reason, the number of safe and unsafe abortions worldwide has only been successfully tracked twice before, in 1995 and 2003. When the 2008 data is compared with these other data points, changes corroborate findings from the World Health Organization and the Guttmacher Institute that indicate "that the global abortion rate has stalled."

The Economist writes of the abortion rate: "It fell precipitously in the 1990s, but recently the rate has not budged, barely dipping from 29 abortions per 1,000 women (aged 15 to 44) in 2003 to 28 abortions per 1,000 women in 2008." During this interval of time, the "geography of abortions has also shifted. In 2008, 86% of abortions were in the developing world, up from 78% in 1995. The share of unsafe abortions rose as well, from 44% in 1995 to 49% in 2008." Currently, "Eastern Europe has the highest abortion rate in the world, at 43 per 1,000."

Interestingly, the level of legal restriction on abortions does not appear to limit their frequency. The Economist notes, "Laws that restrict abortion did not seem to lower the number of procedures. On the contrary, restrictive laws were associated with higher rates."

Gingrich Surging in South Carolina

2012-01-19T16:22:00.000-05:00

Nate Silver unequivocally answers a question he posed yesterday--does Newt Gingrich have momentum in South Carolina?--in his FiveThirtyEight blog post today: "Yes, Mr. Gingrich does have momentum — and a lot of it." He writes, "Six different South Carolina polls have been released so far today, and they show a split in their results." Three of them, automated polls by Rasmussen Reports, Public Policy Polling and InsiderAdvantage, "have Mr. Gingrich in the lead...by margins ranging from 2 points to 6 points."

The polls strongly indicate that Mr. Gingrich's performance at the Monday debate has contributed to his rise in the polls. Marist for NBC News, one of the more traditional polls conducted by live interviewers, "showed Mitt Romney leading by 10 percentage points." But when Marist "split its results," it appeared that the debate did indeed give Mr. Gingrich some momentum with South Carolina voters. Mr. Silver writes, "Mr. Romney’s lead was smaller — 5 points — in the post-debate sample." Further, the aforementioned automated polls that show Mr. Gingrich in the lead "were conducted on Wednesday, after the debate and the qualified endorsement Mr. Gingrich received from Sarah Palin."

The FiveThirtyEight forecast model suggests that Mr. Gingrich is, in fact, gaining significant momentum. According to Mr. Silver, "The model now shows a virtual tie in the race, with Mr. Gingrich projected to get 34 percent of the vote and Mr. Romney 33.6 percent and each candidate having about a 50 percent chance of winning."

Most of Mr. Gingrich's gain, however, does not appear to be connected to a drop in the polls for Mr. Romney. Mr. Silver notes, "Mr. Gingrich has gained ground in the polls more than Mr. Romney has lost it. Two days ago, our forecast had Mr. Gingrich with 22.6 percent of the vote, so he has gained about 11 points since then. Meanwhile, Mr. Romney’s projection has declined less than 3 points — to 33.6 percent from 36.1 percent — over the same interval."

So where is Mr. Gingrich getting his new projected votes? According to Mr. Silver, "Mr. Gingrich’s gains have come from Rick Santorum and Rick Perry (who dropped out of the race today and endorsed Mr. Gingrich), as well as from undecided voters." Mr. Silver does go on to acknowledge that automated polls, because they usually do not call cell phones and "also generally have lower response rates than traditional polls," may not be the best source.

For now, Mr. Silver anticipates that the Saturday primary could yield a number of different results. He writes: "Our research shows that high levels of volatility and disagreement in the polls make polling aggregation methods less reliable. In other words, the margin of error on the forecast is especially high, enough so that either Mr. Romney or Mr. Gingrich could emerge with a clear victory by the time that the vote takes place on Saturday."

Compared With OECD Countries, Latin America Trails in Effort to Reduce Poverty, Inequality

2012-01-19T08:00:00.000-05:00

The Economist recently summarized a report by the OECD which supports findings that "compared with rich countries, Latin American countries still fall short" in the fight to "reduce poverty and inequality." Even within the OECD, which The Economist recognizes as "a club of mostly rich countries," it is a Latin American country, Chile, which performs the worst in these efforts.

The report, according to The Economist, identifies Chile as the OECD's "most unequal member." (Although Brazil is shown in the visual, it is not an OECD country). Further, Chile "also finished third from the bottom, ahead only of Mexico and Israel, in relative poverty, measured by the share of the population earning less than half the median income."

The Economist notes, "Governments can reduce poverty and inequality through taxes and cash transfers." It argues that Chile does not effectively reduce poverty or inequality because of deficiencies in these areas. In Chile, "Government spending on health, education and social policies is low, around 16% of GDP; the OECD average is around 27%." And that's not Chile's only problem: "Tax evasion by corporations and individuals alone is estimated to cost the government some 2.5% of GDP."

The Chilean government has introduced a program, Ingreso Ético Familiar, aimed at fixing these problems. But The Economist points out that "the new cash transfer programme only targets the extreme poor." So how could these problems in Chile be better targeted? The Economist suggests, "More efficient and progressive taxes would raise revenues and reduce inequality." Looking forward in Chile, The Economist notes, "Better job opportunities and higher quality education are needed to improve labour productivity and boost growth."

For First Time, China's Urban Residents Outnumber Rural

2012-01-18T11:29:00.001-05:00

The Economist's daily chart focuses on the movement of China's people into urban areas. At the end of 2011, and according to data from the National Bureau of Statistics, 1.35 billion, or 51.3 percent of China's residents lived in cities, meaning that for the first time the country's "city-dwellers now outnumber its rural residents." According to The Economist, as recently as "1980 less than a fifth of China’s population lived in cities, a smaller proportion than in India."

In the ten years that followed, the Chinese government "remained wary of free movement, even as it made its peace with free enterprise." It "sought industrialisation without urbanisation," only to ultimately realize that "it could not have one without the other." And although the percentage of city-dwellers is on the rise, it seems that the Chinese government's wariness toward urban development has slowed the movement of its citizens to cities. The Economist notes, "Even now, its ratio of city-dwellers is, if anything, low for an economy at its stage of development."

Fed Apparently Blindsided By Financial Crisis

2012-01-17T15:00:00.000-05:00

A recent Wall Street Journal article discusses documents released Thursday that contain transcripts from closed-door Fed meetings during 2006. These transcripts include statements made by Fed chairman Ben Bernanke and other Fed officials, including Timothy Geithner (President of the Federal Reserve Bank of New York at the time and now U.S. Treasury Secretary), that suggest that they were more or less blindsided by the magnitude and speed at which housing prices would decline and the resulting financial crisis. The following image from the article shows housing sales and the share of mortgages on which payments are past due by 90 days or more from 2001 to 2011. Each graph indicates the two dates (labeled 1 and 2) during which the meetings that were included in the recently released documents occurred in 2006, in addition to comments made at those meetings by Bernanke and Geithner. As the first graph shows, U.S. sales of existing homes was slightly down at roughly $6.3 million from its peak in 2005 of over $7 million at both meetings. They had not yet started on the rapid decline that began almost immediately after the second meeting and ultimately resulted in sales lower than $4 million by 2009. Similarly, the second graph shows that the share of mortgage payments overdue by more than 90 days were up slightly during both meetings but had not yet began on the rapid climb from roughly 1% in 2007 to 5% in 2010. Furthermore, the comments of the Fed, Geithner, and Bernanke included alongside the graphs suggest a major lack of foresight on all of their parts (most notably Bernanke’s prediction that a “soft landing” was the “likely scenario”). As the article points out, the release of these documents may have been particularly ill-timed for the Fed with criticism mounting against it, as illustrated by Ron Paul’s “end the Fed!” chant after the New Hampshire primary. However, at least one former Fed governor whose statements were included in the transcripts, Susan Bies, came out unscathed with her warnings of the risks of mortgage-backed securities and household debt during one of the 2006 meetings.

Deadline alert for ICPSR Research Paper Competition

2012-01-17T14:04:00.000-05:00

Two weeks from today, January 31, is the last day that entries into the ICPSR Research Paper Competition for undergraduate and graduate students will be accepted. For prizes, forms, and details, see http://www.icpsr.umich.edu/icpsrweb/content/ICPSR/prize/index.html

3.2 Million Job Openings in November

2012-01-16T08:00:00.000-05:00

A report from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) shows that there were 3.2 million job openings in November, unchanged from October. This is still below the 4.4 million job openings that were recorded when the recession officially started in December 2007, though it exceeds by one million the number of openings in July 2009, which was "the most recent trough for the series." According to the report, "The number of job openings has increased 30 percent since the end of the recession in June 2009."

The report notes, "Several industries saw increases in the number of job openings over the year, while the number of job openings decreased for finance and insurance, professional and business services, and federal government. The Midwest and South regions had increases in the number of job openings and the West experienced a decline over the year."

The BLS Editor's Desk further summarizes, "There were 2.8 million job openings in private industry. Within private industry, there were 87,000 job openings in construction, and 606,000 in education and health services."

Early Polls Show Romney's Lead in South Carolina Shrinking

2012-01-13T08:00:00.000-05:00

Nate Silver of the FiveThirtyEight blog writes that the first South Carolina GOP primary poll contradicts his earlier prediction that Mitt Romney would increase "his modest lead in the South Carolina polls once his victory in New Hampshire was reflected in the surveys there." Instead, the poll, an automated survey from InsiderAdvantage, "shows Mr. Romney’s lead contracting in South Carolina," though Silver "urge[s] a lot of caution in interpreting it."

The poll "was conducted on Wednesday and shows Mr. Romney with 23 percent of the vote, just 2 points ahead of Newt Gingrich at 21 percent. The poll has Rick Santorum and Ron Paul tied for third place at 13 percent, with Jon M. Huntsman Jr. having moved ahead of Rick Perry for fifth place."

But Silver is not completely sold on InsiderAdvantage. He writes, "InsiderAdvantage has a mixed track record and rates fairly poorly in the FiveThrityEight pollster ratings, which is one reason to interpret these numbers with some care. In addition, Matt Towery, the head of InsiderAdvantage, formerly served as the head of Mr. Gingrich’s political organization from 1992 until Mr. Gingrich left Congress."

Silver does note, however, that "another polling firm that rates more highly, Public Policy Polling, said in a series of Twitter messages that it has also detected a tight race between Mr. Romney and Mr. Gingrich in South Carolina, with little evidence of favorable momentum for Mr. Romney following his New Hampshire victory."

Negative early news for Romney in South Carolina is partially offset by early polling in Florida, however. Silver writes: "Confusing matters further is that a poll of Florida, from Rasmussen Reports, did show some gains for Mr. Romney. The poll, conducted on Wednesday, showed Mr. Romney with 41 percent of the vote there, better than he has done in any prior survey of the state. The poll also showed Mr. Gingrich’s numbers on the decline." Silver predicts that "if the initial results from South Carolina and Florida are confirmed by other pollsters, they would suggest that Florida could play a backstop role for Mr. Romney, in somewhat the same way that New Hampshire did for him relative to Iowa."

However, at this stage Silver suggests that we wait before attaching much weight to the early poll results from either South Carolina or Florida.

Data in Review: The Price of Movie Tickets

2012-01-13T07:00:00.000-05:00

Why do all movie tickets cost the same? Movie tickets don't fluctuate in price according to supply and demand. Blockbuster sellouts and movie flops all sell for the same price. To explain this occurence, an article from The Atlantic briefly explains the history of movie prices, demonstrating that during the first half of the twentieth century, movie tickets used to cost different amounts depending on their actors and popularity. Since this time, the system gradually shifted so that ticket prices from the 1970s onwards have been generally uniform across movies.

The line graph depicts how theater attendance fluctuates through the year. Christmas is shown as the high point of the year in terms of ticket sales, while the time periods directly following Easter and Labor Day see relatively low ticket sales.

The chart does have a few shortcomings, however. The article fails to tell us the data's source. We do not know whether the graph is plotting the data from a single theater, or from an aggregate of theaters of over the course of a year. We also don't know when the data were collected. The article doesn't communicate what year or years the data come from, and there is no caption or title to further explain these details. It is also unclear what the unit of measurement is. Does 12% average weekly attendance convey the proportion of seats that are filled in a theater? Does 4% attendance during a given week represent how much that this specific week accounts for in the year's attendance?

Though displaying several trends on one set of axes, the second graph is significantly clearer. The graph shows tickets per capita and the average price of a ticket from 1929 through 2001. Unlike the first graph, the axes are well labeled and they clarify the unit of measure. Although the bar chart and trend graph are superimposed on each other, they utilize the better part of the chart area. Unfortunately, the chart does not include the source of the data or a title, both of which would further clarify the the meaning of the information being represented. It would also be useful to articulate whether admissions prices are adjusted for inflation, a factor that is necessary to take into account when looking at such a large time span.

Obama Loses Latino Approval with Rise in Deportations

2012-01-12T12:00:00.000-05:00

The majority of Latinos in the United States oppose the way in which the Obama administration is addressing the deportation of illegal immigrants, according to a survey conducted by the Pew Hispanic Center.

Since 2009, under President Obama, deportations have increased to an annual average of 400,000. This represents a 30% increase in annual average of deportations since the second term of the Bush administration and is almost double the annual average of deportations during the first term of the Bush administration.

A vast majority (81%) of the 11.2 million immigrants in the United States without authorization are of Hispanic origin. Individuals of Hispanic origin constitute an even larger percentage of deported unauthorized immigrants, with 97% of those deported in 2010 identifying as having Hispanic origin.

Not all Latinos are cognizant of the increase in deportations during Obama's presidency. A little over a third of Latinos polled (36%) responded that the Bush administration deported about the same number of immigrants as the Obama administration deports currently. Fewer than half of the Latinos polled reported knowledge of the increase in deportations under the Obama administration; 41% claimed that deportations had increased during Obama's presidency.

Foreign-born Hispanics are much more likely than native-born Hispanics to be aware of the increase in deportations since Obama assumed office. Whereas 55% of foreign-born Hispanics were aware of this trend, only 25% of native-born Hispanics were. Awareness of the increase in deportations is most prevalent among Hispanic individuals who have greater chances of being deported. Almost three-quarters of Hispanic immigrants who do not have United States citizenship or a green card, a population with a high risk of being deported, are aware that deportations have increased under the Obama administration.

Those who disapprove of Obama's policy are likely to be those who are aware that deportations have increased under the Obama administration.

Countries Compared on Nuclear Security

2012-01-11T14:56:00.000-05:00

The Economist ranked 32 countries according to nuclear security, measured by their ability to safely contain nuclear material which could potentially be used in the creation of nuclear weapons. The 32 countries included are those which possess over one kilogram of the type of nuclear material used to construct weapons. The nuclear security index was developed by the Economist Intelligence Unit and the Nuclear Threat Initiative. According the the Nuclear Threat Initiative, measures of nuclear security include "indicators in physical protection, control and accounting, personnel and security infrastructure, security during transport and response capabilities." Countries with nuclear weapons tend to rank lower on nuclear security due to the fact that they are in possession of larger quantities of nuclear materials. Britain received a higher score on the nuclear security index than any other country known to possess nuclear weapons.

Ranking Countries by Misery Index

2012-01-11T13:59:00.000-05:00

On Monday, The Economist published their 2011 "Misery Index", which is determined by a given country's rate of unemployment and inflation. The Economist ranked 92 countries on this index, with Macedonia displaying the highest level of misery due to instability following the death of President Gligorov. Qatar's combined unemployment and inflation rates of roughly 2.5% earned it the lowest level of misery in The Economist's study.

Record-High Percentage of American Independents

2012-01-10T15:02:00.000-05:00

Gallup’s party identification poll found that the percentageof American identifying as independents hit a record high in 2011. Gallup cites "the sluggish economy, recordlevels of distrust in government, and unfavorable views of both parties" ascauses for this record. These results,however, closely mirror recent results in the year directly preceding apresidential election year. Spikes inindependent political affiliation also occurred in 1995, 1999, 2003, and 2007.

As in most years since 1988, Democrats outnumberRepublicans, 31% to 27%. When measuringparty identification including independent leanings, however, those identifyingas Republican or leaning Republican constituted 45% of respondents, equalingthe 45% responding as Democrat or leaning Democratic. Though Democrats and Democratic leaners ledby one percent in 2010, this gap is significantly smaller than Gallup’s poll resultssince 2004. Says Gallup: "If nationalconditions and the political environment do not change appreciably…independentidentification – even if it declines – will probably remain on the higher endof what Gallup has measured historically."

New Study Shows Teachers--and Test Scores--Matter in the Long-Term

2012-01-10T10:45:00.000-05:00

A new study by three economists suggests that elementary- and middle-school teachers who help increase their students' standardized-test scores have a significant, positive and lasting impact on those students' lives in the long term. Their influence extends beyond academics, as good teachers also mean "lower teenage-pregnancy rates and greater college matriculation and adult earnings," writes the New York Times. The study tracked the lives of 2.5 million students over 20 years, "allowing for a deeper look at how much the quality of individual teachers matters over the long term."

Although the economists set out to challenge the use of value-added ratings, which according to the Times "measure the impact individual teachers have on student test scores," researchers ultimately found that "controlling for numerous factors, including students’ backgrounds...the value-added scores consistently identified some teachers as better than others, even if individual teachers’ value-added scores varied from year to year." They concluded that "using value-added scores would lead to fewer mistakes, not more."

And the positive effect of teachers who increased student test scores was striking. The Times notes, "Replacing a poor teacher with an average one would raise a single classroom’s lifetime earnings by about $266,000, the economists estimate. Multiply that by a career’s worth of classrooms." The researchers surmise that the same results would be obtained by replacing an average teacher with an excellent teacher: "Given the difficulty of finding, training and retaining outstanding teachers...the difference in long-term outcome between students who have average teachers and those with poor-performing ones is as significant as the difference between those who have excellent teachers and those with average ones."

The positive effect of an excellent teacher on one individual student is less impressive than that teacher's potential impact on the entire class taken together, of course. "All else equal, a student with one excellent teacher for one year between fourth and eighth grade would gain $4,600 in lifetime income, compared to a student of similar demographics who has an average teacher. The student with the excellent teacher would also be 0.5 percent more likely to attend college." Still, "students with top teachers are less likely to become pregnant as teenagers, more likely to enroll in college, and more likely to earn more money as adults."

The study will likely add fuel to the value-added score debate, as many people--and teachers' unions--"say that isolating the effect of a given teacher is harder than it seems, and might unfairly penalize some instructors." The researchers of this study are firmly on the other side: "The authors argue that school districts should use value-added measures in evaluations, and...remove the lowest performers." One of the researchers, Harvard Professor John N. Friedman, was quoted in the Times as saying, “The message is to fire people sooner rather than later.”

Student Paper Competition deadline approaching

2012-01-09T10:40:00.000-05:00

There's still time! Deadline for ICPSR's student paper competitions is January 31, 2012: http://www.icpsr.umich.edu/icpsrweb/content/ICPSR/prize/index.html

Obama Starts New Year with 46% Job Approval

2012-01-09T07:00:00.000-05:00

Gallup polling in early January finds that President Obama's job approval rating is at 46 percent, an improvement over most data since August 2011, when his approval typically scored in the low 40 percent range. Obama recorded "monthly approval averages of 41% in August, September, and October, and 43% in November and December." According to Gallup's Jeffrey M. Jones, "The current 46% rating for Obama, based on Jan. 2-4 polling, is one percentage point below his recent high three-day averages of 47% in Dec. 29-Jan. 3 and Dec. 21-23 tracking." The rating is still lower than last January, however, when Obama averaged 49 percent approval over the month.

Jones writes, "Obama's approval rating will be a critical indicator of his re-election chances this year. If he can sustain higher approval ratings through early November, his odds of winning a second term will increase." Historical data has shown "that all presidents since Eisenhower with approval ratings above 50% have won re-election easily." More recently, "George W. Bush was re-elected in 2004 with 48% approval at the time of the election." But Obama would not have to fall very far for Jones to anticipate trouble: "If Obama's approval rating reverts to the low 40% range, he would have a difficult time defeating a Republican in a two-candidate race."

Jones identifies independents as a key group Obama must target if he hopes to increase his approval rating. "Currently, 81% of Democrats, 42% of independents, and 10% of Republicans approve of Obama. By comparison, last January, when he had an overall monthly average of 49%, Obama's approval rating was 83% among Democrats, 47% among independents, and 13% among Republicans."

One potential reason for the modest uptick in Obama's rating this month "could be the improvement in Americans' economic confidence in recent days." But Jones says " it is unclear whether that will last." Further, "January brings challenges for Obama to maintain higher approval ratings, given that much of the political focus will be on the Republican nomination contest, with the GOP candidates seeking to point out Obama's shortcomings as president in order to help their chances of winning the nomination."

Obama does, however, have the State of the Union address January 24, which according to Jones presents "a unique opportunity for him to directly state his case for re-election to Americans."

U.S. Poor Less Likely to Rise Ranks than Poor in Comparable Countries

2012-01-08T12:58:00.000-05:00

Jason DeParle of the New York Times highlights a troubling development: The country of the frequently cited--and much lauded--American Dream is struggling to provide opportunities for economic mobility to its poorest citizens. America is falling behind comparable countries, and "Americans [today] enjoy less economic mobility than their peers in Canada and much of Western Europe."

As Occupy Wall Street and the recession that helped bring about the movement's rise gain the public's attention, even the political right has started to acknowledge the seriousness of class differences. The Times comments: "Liberal commentators have long emphasized class, but the attention on the right is largely new."

DeParle identifies deep poverty and problems in the educational system as two central reasons for America's failure to sufficiently provide the necessary opportunities for social mobility. According to DeParle, the former "leaves poor children starting especially far behind," while "the unusually large premiums that American employers pay for college degrees...increases the importance of family background and stymies people with less schooling."

He cites a project led by Swedish economist Markus Jantti, one that DeParle says "found that 42 percent of American men raised in the bottom fifth of incomes stay there as adults. That shows a level of persistent disadvantage much higher than in Denmark (25 percent) and Britain (30 percent) - a country famous for its class constraints."

Evidence that upward mobility is harder to come by may be especially bad news for the political right, which often responds to liberal complaints of economic inequality by pointing at the high mobility rate. DeParle writes: "While liberals often complain that the United States has unusually large income gaps, many conservatives have argued that the system is fair because mobility is especially high, too: everyone can climb the ladder." Now, however, "evidence suggests that America is not only less equal, but also less mobile."

A comparison with Canada, a country closer to the United States in its culture and demographics, is similarly discouraging. "Miles Corak, an economist at the University of Ottawa, found that just 16 percent of Canadian men raised in the bottom tenth of incomes stayed there as adults, compared with 22 percent of Americans. Similarly, 26 percent of American men raised at the top tenth stayed there, but just 18 percent of Canadians."

Airline Customer Service Rankings

2012-01-06T14:56:00.000-05:00

The Wall Street Journal's Middle Seat article presents its rankings of major airlines based upon different aspects of customer service, including on-time arrivals, flight delays, baggage handling and canceled flights. The chart from the article shows the rankings across the various categories of seven major airlines, among which American placed last overall and Alaska, the smallest of the seven, placed first. Also noteworthy was Delta's second place ranking, which is up from ninth in 2010 among major airlines. American Airlines' poor ranking comes as no surprise, as the airline filed for bankruptcy in November. According to the article, the airline blames its aging fleet, as frequent mechanical breakdowns have caused increased cancellations. It also blames extraordinary weather, including a hailstorm in Dallas that damaged 50 jets. The article also points out the detrimental effect that United and Continental's 2010 merger has had on customer service.

You Are Not What You Eat?

2012-01-05T13:55:00.000-05:00

In a recent Wall Street Journal article, Ron Winslow discusses a study on weight gain that is to be published in the Journal of the American Medical Association. Participants in the study, "25 young, healthy men and women," were all fed 1,000 excess calories a day for 56 days as part of either a low-protein, normal or high-protein diet. The amount of carbohydrates was kept constant across all three diets while fat intake varied according to the protein intake of each diet (higher protein diets had lower fat intake and vice versa). As the chart from the article (above) indicates, increases in body fat were the same across all different diets. According to Winslow, this suggests that the amount of excess caloric intake alone affects body fat increases, as opposed to the nutritional content (fat, protein, carbohydrates, etc.) of a diet. However, as the chart also indicates, those consuming a low-protein diet experienced a decrease in lean body mass while those following the normal and high-protein diets experienced an increase. This is suggested to contribute to overall weight gain being significantly lower for those following a low-protein diet. While the study suggests that high protein diets do not prevent increases in body fat, it may lead some to believe they are superior because they support lean body mass. As Dr. Bay, a researcher at Pennington Biomedical Research Center, puts it, "there is no health-related benefit to a reduction in lean body mass," and loss of lean body mass is "not what you want to happen."

Mormon Republicans Loyal to Romney; Atheist Republicans Disproportionately Go For Paul

2012-01-04T12:08:00.000-05:00

According to Gallup, Republican and Republican-leaners of voting age who identify as Mormon are disproportionately likely to support Mitt Romney, while Ron Paul garners more support among atheist Republicans than he does among Republicans of all religious denominations. Romney collects 71 percent of the Mormon Republican vote, exceeding the 23 percent he scores among all Republicans, and Paul garners 19 percent of the atheist vote, more than the 10 percent of all Republicans who support him. Gallup surmises that Paul's support among atheist Republicans at least partly reflects "the youthful skew in Paul's support and the tendency for young Americans to have no formal religious identity."

But Republican voters do not always support the candidate who shares their religious denomination: "Catholic Republicans were no more likely than average to support the two Catholics in the GOP race, Newt Gingrich and Rick Santorum; Protestant Republicans did not disproportionately support any particular candidate." 26 percent of Republicans who identify as Catholic support Gingrich, less than the 28 percent of all Republicans who support him. And four percent support Santorum, only slightly more than the three percent of all Republicans who support him.

Similar to Catholic Republicans, Protestant Republicans "reflect the overall sample average in their candidate support." The three major Protestant candidates are Ron Paul, Rick Perry, and Michele Bachmann (who has just suspended her campaign). Paul only gets 10 percent of the Protestant vote, which matches his score among all Republicans; Perry gets eight percent of the Protestant vote, only one more percentage point than his support among all Republicans; and Bachmann scores seven percent of the Protestant vote, just surpassing the six percent of all Republicans who support her.

Although Romney attracts the vast majority of the Mormon Republican vote, Mormons represent a relatively small percentage of the voting population. Gallup writes: "Given that Mormons constitute about 2% of American adults and 4% of Republicans nationally, the more important factor may be any possible effect that Romney's faith has on the vote of highly religious non-Mormons, a much larger voting bloc. The current data show that highly religious Protestants do give Romney slightly lower support than he gets among all Republicans, although the five-point difference is not huge."

Trends in Education

2012-01-03T14:34:00.000-05:00

The New York Times reports on how students in New York's schools have performed based on data from the National Assessment of Educational Progress, which is often referred to as the nation's report card. According to the article, the math scores as reported by the city's schools dropped slightly over the two-year period.

Fourth grade math score average dropped by three points, from 237 to 234, while eighth grade scores averaged at 272, one point lower than in 2009. The fourth grade reading score average remained the same as that in 2009, while the eighth grade average increased by two points to 254.

This trend, however, does not conform to the nationwide trend showing that test scores for both fourth and eighth graders are either the same or higher this year than ever before. Nationally, fourth grade scores in both reading and math increased by one point. While eighth grade reading scores stayed the same, the math average is higher by one point. However, experts advise that the slight drop in the test scores of New York students is not large enough to be significant. The national trends are shown in the four line graphs below.

One important fact to note is that New York City's achievement gap between black and white students is shrinking. While black students scored 29 points lower than white students on reading tests in 2002, in 2011 they scored 26 points lower. Black students also scored an average of 25 points lower on fourth grade math tests in 2003, compared with 22 points lower in 2011.

Pew: Public's Frustration with Congress Could Cost Republican Incumbents in 2012

2011-12-27T16:00:00.000-05:00

The Pew Research Center for the People and the Press reports that "discontent with Congress has reached record levels, and the implications for incumbents in next year’s elections could be stark." Two-thirds of respondents say that "most" congressional members should be voted out of office in 2012, the highest percentage on record. And Americans are not very forgiving of their own; 33 percent say they do not want to see their own representatives reelected. According to Pew, this "matches the all-time high recorded in 2010, when fully 58 members of Congress lost reelection bids – the most in any election since 1948."

Survey results suggest that the American public is particularly frustrated with the Republican Party, and that Republican incumbents stand to lose the most from the public's discontent. Pew comments: "A record-high 50% say that the current Congress has accomplished less than other recent Congresses, and by nearly two-to-one (40% to 23%) more blame Republican leaders than Democratic leaders for this." Americans are critical of Republican leaders' political approach: "By wide margins, the GOP is seen as the party that is more extreme in its positions, less willing to work with the other side to get things done, and less honest and ethical in the way it governs. And for the first time in over two years, the Democratic Party has gained the edge as the party better able to manage the federal government."

Americans are not putting all the blame on Republicans, of course; they appear to be dissatisfied with Congress as a whole. Democrats survive with more approval than Republicans, but Americans still do not view them very favorably: "Just 31% approve of how Democratic congressional leaders have performed." Still, comparisons between the two parties do indicate that congressional Democrats are at the very least less-disliked than Republicans. For example, while a minority of Americans approve of Democratic congressmen, an even smaller percentage (21%) say they approve of the job Republican leaders have done. In addition, the Democratic Party has retained more support from its base: "While Democrats approve of the job their party’s leaders are doing by a 60% to 31% margin, only 49% of Republicans approve of the GOP leaders in Congress are doing, while 44% disapprove."

The negative Republican attitude differs from the recent historical trend; in recent election cycles, voters from the political party with a House majority say that a majority of congressional members should be reelected. Now, however, "seven-in-ten Republicans say most members of Congress should be replaced, as do 73% of independents and 60% of Democrats."

Americans largely single out current congressional members, and not the political system in which they serve, as the problem. Pew writes: "In assessing Congress, 55% of the public says they think the system can work fine, it’s the members that are the problem. Just 32% say they think most members have good intentions but the political system is broken. The balance of opinion is virtually identical across party lines."

Independents do not express positive views toward either political party, but they are especially critical of Republicans. "By a 54% to 30% margin they say the Republican Party, not the Democratic Party, is more extreme in its positions, and they are twice as likely to label the Republicans than the Democrats as the less honest and ethical party (42% vs. 21%)."

If congressional members--particularly Republicans--hope to hold onto their jobs come 2012, it seems they will have a lot of work to do.

U.S. Diabetes Rate Reverses Course, Declines in 2011

2011-12-22T14:52:00.000-05:00

Recent survey data from the Gallup-Healthways Well-Being Index indicates that the U.S. diabetes rate has decreased in 2011, reversing an upward trend that characterized the previous two years. In the third quarter of this year, 11 percent of Americans reported having diabetes, up from 10.6 percent in this year's second quarter, but still "among the lowest levels recorded since 2009." According to Gallup, "The diabetes rate was below 11% throughout 2008, but then began to increase in 2009 and 2010." 11.5 percent of Americans reported having diabetes before January of this year.

The declining diabetes rate mirrors a decline in the percentage of Americans who are obese. Gallup comments: "The obesity rate, which has a well-established relationship with the most common form of diabetes -- Type 2 -- also declined slightly in the second and third quarter of this year, with somewhat lower levels in 2011 compared with 2010."

As the percentage of Americans who are obese declines, so should the percentage of Americans with Type 2 diabetes. "Gallup has found that obese Americans are nearly three times as likely to report having been diagnosed with diabetes as those who are not obese, and that states with the highest obesity rates have much higher diabetes levels than those with the lowest obesity rates."

There is no cure for diabetes, so any decrease in its prevalence should reflect "fewer new cases and a reduction in old cases through mortality." If Americans continue to lose weight, it is likely that a smaller percentage of them will get Type 2 diabetes, and the U.S. diabetes rate will continue to fall.

Hardest-Working Countries in 2011

2011-12-19T15:55:00.000-05:00

As the end of the work year approaches, the Economist’s daily charthighlights employee holiday entitlements around the world using Mercer data. Of the 19 countries shown, Canada gives thefewest holidays per year, with a statutory minimum of 10 days and with afurther 9 public holidays. China isclose behind, with 2 more total holidays per year, followed closely by theUnited States, who comes in 14^th with 25 total holidays peryear. The economically unstablecountries of Spain and Greece rank 4^th and 2^nd, with 36and 37 days off respectively. Austria’s38 holidays per year in 2011 tops the list.

For a further examination of additional employment figures,such as sick days, view the Economist’s related videographic.

U.S. marriage rate hits a record low

2011-12-16T16:50:00.000-05:00

The Pew Research Center released an analysis of new 2010 U.S. Census data on marriage, which shows a record low in the percentage of married U.S.adults. Only 51% of adults ages 18 andover reported being married, down from 72% in 1960. Over the same 50-year period, divorce orseparation has increased from 5% to 14%, and the percent never marriedincreased from 15% to 28%.

The most telling trend in terms of marital trends can befound in the young adult population. Twenty percentof those ages 18 to 29 reported being married, just over one third of thepercent married 50 years ago (59%). Inaddition, the median age of first marriage has increased by roughly six percentover this time period, up to roughly 28 years old.

Though Pew does not definitively explain the decliningtrends in marriage, they cite the rising share of young adults enrolled incollege and “fallout from the Great Recession” as potential contributingfactors. Pew also cites a U.N. report onmarriage in developed nations between the 1990s and 2000s, quoting: “this was ‘duein part to an increasing acceptance of consensual [cohabiting] unions as areplacement for marital unions,’” which may also contribute to decliningpercentages in the United States.

FiveThirtyEight: Gingrich Leads Five Plausible GOP Candidates in Iowa

2011-12-14T12:31:00.000-05:00

In a recent FiveThirtyEight blog post, Nate Silver shared a preview of his polling-based forecasts for the Iowa caucuses and New Hampshire primary, the official versions of which he plans to release in a few days. The statistical analysis is based on state-by-state polling; Silver writes that although more objective and subjective factors could be taken into account, "building a well-calibrated forecast from the polls is challenging enough given the uncertainties inherent in primary polling, and so that’s what we’ve decided to focus on rather than anything fancier."

The polling-based analysis for Iowa has Newt Gingrich projected to win 25.1% of the vote, followed by Ron Paul, with 20.7%; Mitt Romney (15.6%); Rick Perry (12.3%); and Michele Bachmann (11.4%); and both Rick Santorum and Jon Huntsman Jr., who are projected to garner under 10 percent of the vote. In his blog post, Silver explains the three factors used to calculate the projections: a weighted polling average, which emphasizes more recent polling as being a better predictor of probable primary results; the reallocated average, "which takes undecided voters and allocates them among the viable candidates;" and a process Silver calls momentum, which "looks at the near-term trend in a candidate’s polling and assigns a small bonus or penalty based upon it."

Silver warns, however, that these projections "are not very precise, because primary polling is not very precise." He tries to quantify this uncertainty, providing both confidence intervals for each candidate's projections and their win probability, "which combines the vote projections and the uncertainty together to estimate how likely each candidate is to win the caucuses." Gingrich leads with an estimated 49.6% probability, followed by Paul, with 28.2%; Romney (10.6%); Perry (5.2%); and Bachmann (4.1%).

According to Silver's analysis, "Although Mr. Gingrich still has the lead, Iowa looks to be fairly wide open with as many as five plausible winners.

Income Inequality Continues to Rise in OECD Countries

2011-12-05T16:28:00.000-05:00

A recent OECD report shows that the wealth gap in most rich countries continues to grow wider, consistent with an upward trend during the past few decades. The Economist blogged: "The Gini coefficient, a measure of inequality in which zero corresponds to everyone having the same income and one means the richest person has all the income, increased by almost 10% from 0.29 in 1985 to 0.32 in 2008, for working-age people in OECD countries."

Changes in wages have benefited the top 1% of earners most, but relative gains are not limited to them, as "the pay of the richest 10% of employees has increased at a far greater rate than that of the poorest 10% of employees." Gains in technology, because they "disproportionately benefit...high-earning workers," have contributed to increases in income inequality. High earners tend to marry other high earners, which only exacerbates this growing inequality. In addition, "governments are doing less to redistribute wealth than they have done in the past."

The report, however, shies away from identifying globalization as the cause of increased income inequality. Instead, as summarized by the Economist, it argues that "one of the many reasons for the rise in income inequality is that more people are in work now (or at least they were before the financial crisis hit) compared with the 1970s."

Live bird transportation pushes The Twelve Days of Christmas over $100,000

2011-12-01T10:29:00.000-05:00

USA Today and the Associated Press report that rising costsof live bird transportation and general price increases have pushed the cost of“The Twelve Days of Christmas” to an all-time high. For the last 28 years, PNC Wealth Management hasreleased the PNC Christmas Price Index, which is formed using the currentprices of the 364 items mentioned in the 12 verses of the traditional carol “TheTwelve Days of Christmas.” The assortmentof pipers piping, lords-a-leaping, ladies dancing, maids-a-milking,swans-a-swimming, geese-a-laying, gold rings, calling birds, French hens,turtle doves, and partridges in pear trees costs $24,263, and the total of allrepeated items in the twelve verses totals $101,119, a 4.4% from the 2010Christmas Price Index.

Online orders cost $39,860, a 64% increase from in-storeprices. The difference in price is largelydue to an increase in the cost of shipping live birds, according to managingexecutive of investment Jim Dunigan. Dunigan summarizes this year’s findings, stating: “the story in generalis wages are still a very sluggish part of this economy,” noting that the corerate of increase is much less than the 9.2% increase in 2010.

PNC provides an interactive website to explore price changesin these well-known items (image provided above).

ICPSR's real-world experiences for students featured in webinar

2011-11-29T15:40:00.001-05:00

The webinar, conducted Nov. 29, focused on opportunities ICPSR provides to get students involved in social science research. The video is available here (wmv file, 64 MB). The slides are divided into two sections. Information on ICPSR's Research Paper Competitions (PowerPoint, 584kB) was presented by Sue Hodge, and Abayomi Israel spoke about ICPSR's summer internship program (PowerPoint, 10.6 MB). Entry deadline for the Research Paper Competitions is January 31, 2012 and the application deadline for the Summer Internship Program is February 13, 2012.

Persistent URL: http://icpsr.blogspot.com/2011/11/slides-video-available-from-webinar-on.html

Gingrich Joins Romney at Top of GOP Race

2011-11-22T09:30:00.000-05:00

Gallup reported on recent polling data that shows Mitt Romney and Newt Gingrich as the top choices among Republicans for their party's 2012 presidential nominee. 20% of Republicans and Republican-leaning independents nationwide say Romney is their top choice, while 19% say they would most likely support Gingrich; Herman Cain comes in at third with 16%. Among Republicans and Republican-leaners who are currently registered voters, however, Gingrich jumps into first place with 22%, followed closely by Romney (21%) and Cain (16%).

The USA Today/Gallup poll was conducted Nov. 13-17, close to two weeks after a similar Nov. 3-6 poll. In that short time, Gingrich's support has increased from 12% to its current figure of 19% among Republicans nationwide. During this same time, Cain appears to have lost support--perhaps the result of recent allegations of sexual harassment levied against him. While 21% of Republicans supported him in the Nov. 3-6 poll, a smaller 16% favor him today. Rick Perry also continued to slip, from 11% in the last poll to 8% in this most recent one.

While most candidates appear to receive roughly equal support from conservative and moderate/liberal Republicans and Republican-leaners, Gingrich and Cain seem to hang their hat on the more conservative wing of Republican voters. Conservative Republicans and Republican-leaders are most likely to favor Gingrich (23%), followed by Romney (20%) and Cain (18%). But among moderate/liberal Republicans and Republican-leaners, Romney leads the race, checking in with 20% of the votes, while Gingrich and Cain each only garner 12% of the group's vote. According to Gallup, however, "conservatives outnumber moderates and liberals by better than 2-to-1 in the Republican rank-and-file." Gallup writes: "Gingrich and Cain appear to have benefited most from the decline in Perry's support."

Age appears to be a fairly large determinant of respondents' preferences. The GOP race would be a two-man battle between Gingrich (34%) and Romney (28%) if it were up to voters over 65 years of age. In fact, "Gingrich's support is heavily concentrated among Republicans who are at least 50." Part of this, Gallup surmises, may be due to the fact that Gingrich "has been out of public office for more than a decade, and [is] thus a less familiar figure to younger Republicans." Cain and Ron Paul, on the other hand, get most of their support from younger respondents. This would appear to favor Gingrich and Romney, as older Americans are typically more likely to head to the polls than younger Americans.

Gallup concludes: "With the first official nominating contest, the Iowa caucuses, now just six weeks away, there is no clear national front-runner for the Republican nomination...the current contest stands to be the most competitive and perhaps most unpredictable for the Republican nomination since 1972, when the parties shifted the power to choose their presidential nominees away from party leaders at the national convention to the rank-and-file voters in state primaries and caucuses."

Obama Job Approval Rating Up; Romney Remains Main GOP Rival

2011-11-21T07:30:00.002-05:00

A recent survey from Pew People and the Press shows that support for President Obama is up in November, and that Mitt Romney leads a group of GOP candidates about whom the public is not very excited. A majority of Americans (52%) express a favorable view of President Obama, compared with 45% of Americans who hold an unfavorable view. Americans do not hold GOP candidates in such high esteem: more Americans view Romney negatively than positively (42% unfavorable vs. 36% favorable); the same holds true for Newt Gingrich (48% vs. 31%), Herman Cain (50% vs. 29%) and Rick Perry (50% vs. 25%).

As was the case in October, however, the survey suggests that a race between Obama and Romney would run about even, with Romney's support among independents far exceeding Obama's. 49% of respondents say they would vote for Obama in a head-to-head race with Romney, while 47% say they would vote for Romney. Among independents, Romney is the clear winner, with only 41% saying they would vote for Obama, compared with 53% who choose Romney.

Although Obama's overall numbers are up, a majority of Americans (58%) disapprove of his handling of the economy. Only 35% of Americans say he is doing all he can for the economy, with 61% saying he could be doing more. This is a reversal from March 2009 results, when 60% of Americans said Obama was doing all he could, and only 30% said he could be doing more. Still, more respondents (48%) say that they have been hearing a mix of good and bad economic news--matching the 48% who say news is mostly bad--than in October, when 58% of respondents said economic news was mostly bad, as compared with only 39% who said there was a mix of good and bad news. Obama scores better in foreign policy (46% approve) and on his decision to remove all American combat troops from Iraq by the end of the year (75% approve).

Although the survey suggests that Romney would be a strong challenger to Obama in a head-to-head race, Republican voters remain largely unimpressed with the GOP field. Only 48% say Republican candidates are of excellent or fair quality, compared with 46% who rate the field as only fair or poor. Pew writes: "GOP voters’ ratings of the field have shown little improvement since May and are at least as low as ratings for Republican candidates at comparable points in the 2008 and 1996 campaigns."

Where Americans Are Most Likely to Light Up

2011-11-18T18:19:00.000-05:00

According to recent Gallup polling, smoking rates are highest in the South and Midwest, typically states that "have fewer legal smoking restrictions." Smoking rates top out at 29% in Kentucky, followed by six states where 26% of residents smoke. Utah has the lowest percentage of smokers, checking in at only 11%, with California (15%) and Hawaii (16%) closing out the bottom three. 21% of all Americans say they smoke, unchanged from 2008. The number of states with under 20% of residents smoking has increased, from 10 in 2008 to 18 today.

Excluding West Virginia, all states where over 25% of residents smoke are located in the South and Midwest. On the other end, 14 of the 18 states with under 20% of their residents smoking are located in the East or West. Smoking regulations appear to correlate with a state's percentage of smokers. Gallup writes: "There are no bans on smoking in bars in all but one of the states where rates are 25% or higher and no bans on smoking in restaurants in all but two. However, smoking is banned from workplaces, restaurants, and bars in all but 3 of the 18 states where smoking rates are lower than 20%."

Gallup writes of the current nationwide smoking rate of 21%: "Although this is much lower than the historic highs of around 40% Gallup found from the mid-1940s to the mid-1970s, there remains significant variation across states, with smoking levels in many states still at 25% or higher."

Unemployment Rate Decreases Over Past Year in Most Metropolitan Areas

2011-11-17T15:00:00.000-05:00

The U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) released a report this week on metropolitan area employment over the past year, and their findings suggested economic improvement over that period. The BLS Editor's Desk writes: "Unemployment rates were lower in October than a year earlier in 281 of the 372 metropolitan areas, higher in 76 areas, and unchanged in 15 areas. Eight areas recorded jobless rates of at least 15.0 percent, while 21 areas registered rates of less than 5.0 percent." The national unemployment rate checked in at 8.5 percent this October, down from 9.0 percent a year ago.

Unemployment dropped the most in Muskegon-Norton Shores, Michigan (-2.6 percentage points), followed by El Centro, California; Farmington, New Mexico; and Flint, Michigan, all three of which saw a decrease of 2.5 percentage points in the unemployment rate. On the other end, Kennewick-Pasco-Richland, Washington, witnessed the largest increase in unemployment, as the jobless rate rose 1.7 percentage points over the year. It was followed by Yakima, Washington (+ 1.3 percentage points); Pascagoula, Mississippi (+ 1.3 points); and Jacksonville, North Carolina (+1.2 points).

A smaller percentage of metropolitan areas saw increases in nonfarm payroll employment, though a majority still did: "From October 2010 to October 2011, 233 metropolitan areas reported over-the-year increases in nonfarm payroll employment, 133 reported decreases, and 6 had no change."

Metropolitan areas with the largest percentage gains in employment were led by Kankakee-Bradley, Illinois (+ 6.5 percentage points), followed by Hot Springs, Arkansas (+ 6.2 points), and Victoria, Texas (+ 5.5 points). The largest reported losses were in Missoula, Montana (- 5.4 points), Abilene, Texas (- 5.2 points), and Dalton, Georgia (- 4.7 points)."

Esther Isabelle Wilder

2011-11-17T08:02:00.002-05:00

Whether its data from the Cremation Association of North America or the Census Bureau, students in Professor Esther Isabelle Wilder's classes at Lehman College in New York City will always find themselves actively engaged in data analysis. Wilder says, "I find that when my students are actively engaged in data analysis in my classes they learn to appreciate the relevance of the material to their lives and the active learning exercises strengthen their critical thinking skills, particularly insofar as quantitative reasoning is concerned. Moreover, they gain a better understanding of the scientific process and how to make sense of data using computer software. These are skills whose importance extends far beyond any sociology class." She adds, "Doing data analysis also enhances their understanding of course content. For example, in discussing changing mortality patterns across time and throughout the world, the process of gathering data and actually documenting this firsthand promotes an understanding of these trends in a way that lecturing and/or reading about them never could."
Esther Isabelle Wilder is Associate Professor of Sociology at Lehman College, the City University of New York and a member of the Doctoral Faculty at CUNY Graduate Center. She currently teaches Sociology of Healthcare or the Sociology of Death, Dying and Bereavement, directs a Quantitative Reasoning (QR) initiative at the City University of New York (CUNY), and co-directs Lehman College’s QR program. Among her publications are articles in Teaching Sociology on matters related to the quantitative literacy of students, "A Qualitative Assessment of Efforts to Integrate Data Analysis throughout the Sociology Curriculum: Feedback from Students, Faculty and Alumni," (2010) and "Responding to the Quantitative Literacy Gap among Students in Sociology Courses" (2009).
"I also believe that data analysis cannot be treated as an isolated component of course instruction and to the extent that these materials are interwoven into the course content and instructional goals of the course, I think that their success is guaranteed. Students benefit from engaging in all aspects of the scientific process of inquiry using data, including reviewing the literature, formulating hypothesis, engaging in data analysis, interpreting results, and drawing conclusions and communicating results. Revision is also an important pedagogical tool in promoting this kind of instruction since students don't always get things right the first time and benefit from feedback that helps them to strengthen their work" Wilder states.
Wilder recommends resources to her colleagues like those found on TeachingWithData.org and other repositories for use in the classroom and says, "With the proliferation of data resources on the Internet, there is really a wonderful array of opportunities for faculty from all social science disciplines . . . to engage students in active learning doing data analysis."
Professor Wilder earned her PhD in Sociology from Brown University in 1997 and has taught in the Sociology Department at Lehman College since 2002. Lehman College hosts its own collection of modules and resources for sociology instruction (http://www.lehmanida.org/) and has a team of CUNY faculty who are creating a new QR instructional Web site for faculty planned to be housed at the Science Education Resource Center (SERC) at Carleton College.

When Mom and Dad Become Big Brother

2011-11-14T15:04:00.002-05:00

The Pew Internet & American Life Project released new findings on parental monitoring of teenage children's internet activity. According to Pew, "more than three-quarters (77%) of parents say that they have checked to see what websites their child has visited." Pew also found that "two-thirds of parents of online teens have checked to see what information was available online about their child."
More parents check a child's internet activity now than in 2006, when the figure stood at 65%. Pew writes: "White parents of online teens (83%) are more likely to check the websites of their browsing teens than black parents (75%) or Latino parents (64%). Parents in higher-income households and those with at least a high school diploma are also more likely than others to check up on their teen’s online travels."

Additionally, Mothers who use the internet (75%) are more likely than fathers (55%) to say they check information on their children on the internet. Further, "higher-income parents are more likely to do this than those who live in households with more modest incomes." White and black parents are more likely to report doing so than Latino parents, and parents with higher levels of education are also more likely to research their teenage child's "digital reputation." The percentage of parents of girls aged 14-17 (72%) researching their child's internet reputation far exceeds the 55% of parents who research information on younger sons' internet reputations.39% of parents are friends or connected with their children on social networking sites, but Pew found that this connection comes with an increased likelihood of parent-child conflict. "Teens whose parents report that they are friends with their child on social network sites are more likely than teens who aren’t friends with their parents to say that they had a problem with their parents because of an experience on social media (18% vs. 5%)."

Fewer Americans With Employer-Based Health Insurance

2011-11-11T14:17:00.019-05:00

Gallup reports that the percentage of Americans with employer-based health insurance continues to decline. This is likely the result of an increasing number of unemployed and underemployed Americans, but also because there are "fewer employers offering health insurance." When Gallup started tracking Americans' health insurance sources in 2008, nearly 50% of adults 18 and older received health insurance from their employer. This percentage has decreased steadily from 2008 to today, when 44.5% of Americans say they receive employer-based health insurance.These years have also seen an increase in the percentage of uninsured Americans, from 14.6% in 2008 to 17.3% today (though Gallup warns this latter figure may be inflated because in the second half of 2011 surveys were conducted by cell phone, guaranteeing a younger--and more uninsured--respondent population). Gallup has found that 18- to 26- year-olds are less likely to be uninsured than in recent years, perhaps a result of "the provision in the new healthcare law that lets them stay on their parents' health plans until age 26."

But "the other components of the health law that have already been implemented" do not appear to be having the same impact for the larger segment of the population, as "there has been an increase among 25- to- 64-year-olds...without health insurance." These components include "tax credits to help small businesses provide health insurance to their employees and the establishment of a Pre-Existing Condition Insurance Plan among several others." Although the percentage of Americans with government-based health insurance has declined recently, it has still increased since 2008.

Wal-Mart--which "announced in October that new part-time employees who work less than an average of 24 hours a week would no longer be able to get their health insurance from the company--" may present an example that other companies will follow moving forward. Gallup writes: "If Wal-Mart's decision is a precursor of how employers intend to manage their healthcare costs, the downward trend in employer-based healthcare will likely continue."

Among Americans Who Have Heard, Higher Percentage Believe Cain Allegations True

2011-11-10T10:51:00.000-05:00

According to Pew Research Center for the People & the Press, Americans who have heard "a lot" or "a little" about the sexual harassment allegations against Herman Cain are more likely than not to believe that those allegations are true. 39 percent of these respondents believe the allegations are true, compared with 24 percent who believe the claims are false; 36 percent say they don't know or refuse to answer. 51 percent of Americans say they have heard of the allegations "a lot," with an additional 24 percent saying they have heard of them "a little."

Among those who have heard of the allegations, a plurality (43%) say the media coverage has been fair. 24 percent say coverage has been too tough; 14 percent that it has been too easy; and 18 percent say they don't know or neglect to answer. Unsurprisingly, Pew found that partisanship has an impact on respondents' views on the issue: "Democrats are much more likely than Republicans to say they think the allegations are true." Republicans, however, "are more likely to say media coverage has been too tough."

Interestingly, although there was no noticeable difference in responses based on gender for the total population, responses were visibly different along gender lines among GOP and Republican-leaning respondents. Pew writes that "among Republican and Republican-leaners, women are more likely than men to say they think the allegations are false. Among GOP women who have heard about the story, more say the allegations are false (46%) than true (24%) by nearly a two-to-one margin. Among GOP men, impressions are divided about equally (34% true, 33% false)."

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Pew Study Reveals Hows Well Americans Follow Current Events

2011-11-09T16:49:00.002-05:00

Pew Research Center's most recent News IQ survey explores how knowledgeable Americans are regarding current events. The 19-question survey ranged from identifying country maps to recognizing prominent US government officials such as the Secretary of State and Speaker of the House of Representatives. (To test yourself against the results Pew found before reading the summary, follow this link.)

Respondents correctly answered visual questions more often than verbal questions, and scored particularly well when asked to identify prominent political figures. 82% of respondents correctly identified US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, 79% recognized former Libyan leader Muammar Gadhafi, and 70% recognized Charmain of the Federal Reserve Ben Bernanke.

Respondents performed worst when asked to name the British Prime Minister (only 38% correctly chose David Cameron) and when asked to identify the universal symbol of Islam (42%).

Unlike previous surveys, respondents performed significantly differently depending on partisan affiliation. Pew reports: "On 13 out of the 19 questions, Republicans score significantly higher than Democrats and there are no questions on which Democrats did better than Republicans." Republicans were understandably more able to identify that the Republican Party has a majority in the House of Representatives (59% to Democrat's 40%) and that the elephant is a symbol of the GOP (87% to 69%). Republicans were 17 points more likely to identify Greece's debt troubles and 16 points more likely to identify Israel on a map of the Mideast.

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As Men Live Longer, Fewer Older Women Live Alone

2011-11-06T18:40:00.000-05:00

Random Samplings, the U.S. Census Bureau's official blog, recently reported that women are less likely to live alone today than they were a generation ago. Rose Kreider writes: "The increase in life expectancy for men is likely...connected to the decrease in living alone for older women." Because men are living longer, fewer women are widowed; as a result, "the proportion [of women] married and living with their spouse increased from 1971 to 2011."

Interestingly, from 2008 to 2010, there was a 0.8 percent decrease in one-person households, standing out from a generally upward trend in the percentage of one-person households "over the last half of the 20th century and into the 21st century." Kreider warns against assuming the decrease was due to the recession, noting that in the past, the percentage of one-person households "doesn’t look like it is necessarily sensitive to recessions." Rather, it appears that this decrease is more closely related to the rising life expectancy of men, which has increased from 67 years of age in 1971 to 75 in 2007.

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Pew report shows generation gap in 2012 election voting, though not as definitively as is suggested

2011-11-04T15:00:00.000-04:00

The Pew Research Center released a report on age and voting trends this week, attempting to shed light on the potential effect of generation on votes in the 2012 presidential election. The unabridged study claims that "Millenial generation voters are inclined to back Barack Obama for reelection by a wide margin in a match-up against Mitt Romney," whereas Silent generation voters strongly back Romney and Generation X and Baby Boomers hold mixed opinions.

The report certainly highlights the current national public opinion amongst varying age groups. However, the graph included in the brief summary presents the data in a misleading format. Although the data points before 2012 show national exit poll data, the 2012 points show "2012 preference based on registered voters." While this may indicate the trend we may observe next year, the predictive 2012 points are misleadingly placed in the same series as more concrete data from past elections. A number of factors (such as get-out-the-vote and campaigning efforts) could influence the so-called "young-old voting gap" in the twelve months leading up to the presidential election. In addition, the Young-Old Gap figures are presented in a confusing, unexplained format. However, Pew's extended report discusses an issue that is at the forefront of much recent election research: divided public opinion in a potential Obama-Romney general election.

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Brookings Institute: Numbers in Extreme Poverty Jump

2011-11-03T17:10:00.011-04:00

A new report from the Brookings Institute shows that the number of Americans living in extreme-poverty neighborhoods--with at least 40 percent of residents living below the poverty line--sharply increased from 2000 to the end of the decade. By the end of 2010, 10.5 percent of Americans lived in such neighborhoods, up from 9.1 percent at the beginning of the decade. This figure is still better than in 1990, when 14.1 percent of Americans lived in extreme-poverty neighborhoods.

Concentrated poverty has also increased since 2000, particularly in the Midwest and South. Concentrated poverty in Midwestern metropolitan areas doubled from 2000 to 2005-09, rising by one-third in Southern metro areas during the same period. Writes Brookings: "The Great Lakes metro areas of Toledo, Youngstown, Detroit, and Dayton ranked among those experiencing the largest increases in concentrated poverty rates, while the South was home to metro areas posting both some of the largest increases (El Paso, Baton Rouge, and Jackson) and decreases (McAllen, Virginia Beach, and Charleston)." The concentration of poverty in Western metros decreased over this time, although Brookings predicts that this "trend...may have reversed in the wake of the late 2000s housing crisis."

According to the report, concentrated poverty is hitting the suburbs. From 2000 to 2005-09, concentrated poverty increased twice as quickly in suburban areas than in cities. Still, suburban poverty has not reached urban levels; Brookings notes that "poor people in cities remain more than four times as likely to live in concentrated poverty as their suburban counterparts."

Brookings states: "The recession-induced rise in poverty in the late 2000s likely further increased the concentration of poor individuals into neighborhoods of extreme poverty." Concentrated poverty in large metro areas increased by half a percentage from 2000 to 2005-09, but "estimates suggest the concentrated poverty rate rose by 3.5 percentage points in 2010 alone, to reach 15.1 percent."

Brookings has advice for efforts aimed at avoiding even higher concentrations of poverty: "Policies that foster balanced and sustainable economic growth at the regional level, and that forge connections between growing clusters of low-income neighborhoods and regional economic opportunity, will be key to longer-term progress against concentrated disadvantage."

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Discontent in Latin America

2011-11-03T15:15:00.000-04:00

A recent article in The Economist discusses the results of a recent Latinobarómetro poll, which is published exclusively by The Economist and has been conducted since 1995 in 18 different countries. As the chart “A bare democratic majority” shows (below), respondents’ preference for democracy over other types of governments has decreased sharply in Latin America over the last two years. The article speculates that this is the result of high levels of violent crime, especially in Guatemala, Honduras and Mexico. The second graph from the article, “Disgruntled in Santiago,” charts the percent of respondents that said they were “very satisfied” or “somewhat satisfied” with “the way democracy works” in their countries in 2001, 2010, and 2011. While a larger percentage reported being satisfied in 2011 than they did in 2001 in every country except for Costa Rica and Mexico, a majority of countries saw a decline in those satisfied from 2010 to 2011. Across the region as a whole, only 39% of respondents said they were satisfied, which is 5 points lower than last year. There was a particularly profound drop in satisfaction in Chile (from 56% in 2010 to 32% in 2011), which the article suggests may be the result of middle class discontentedness with public services and the high price of education. According to the article, these results are surprising as concerns about the economy and unemployment are down to their “pre-crisis level.” However, as the third graph, “Crimewatch,” indicates, concerns about crime have risen in Latin America even as concerns about the economy have waned. This is particularly true of Venezuela, in which 61% of respondents said that crime was the main problem in their country.

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NYT: Quantitative literacy in demand in job market

2011-11-02T09:09:00.000-04:00

A New York Times article published Sunday titled "Ad Companies Face a Widening Talent Gap" outlines the problems employers are having finding job candidates with quantitative skills.
Statistical analysis is one of the skills advertising agencies are having trouble finding, the article said, and employers often search for months to find appropriate candidates.

The piece goes on: "The digital talent gap is driven in part by the enormous amount of user data that ad tech companies are collecting for agencies and marketers -- data that is instrumental in directing ads to consumers and analyzing trends. New hires are needed for a variety of tasks, including writing code, creating digital advertisements, Web site development and statistical analysis."

TeachingWithData.org is dedicated to providing teaching and learning materials for faculty to use in their classrooms to support students in developing their quantitative skills.

Religion Continues to Play Significant Role in Party Identification

2011-10-31T14:22:00.018-04:00

Gallup interviews conducted over the past four months suggest that "religion remains a significant correlate of political party identification in the U.S. today." As has been the case historically, people who are "very religious" are more likely to identify as Republicans and less likely to identify as Democrats. Survey data shows that 49 percent of very religious Americans identify as Republican or Republican-leaning, as compared with only 30 percent of nonreligious Americans.

Gallup categorized respondents as very, moderately, or not religious based on their answers to two questions regarding "the importance of religion and church attendance." For the very religious, "religion is an important part of daily life" and respondents attend their place of worship once every week (or almost every week). The nonreligious do not consider religion to play an important role in their everyday lives, and they seldom attend services. The moderately religious include "all who do not fall into the very religious or nonreligious groups but who provided valid responses on both religion questions ."

The impact of religion on party identification is most clearly visible among whites: 62 percent of very religious whites identify as Republicans, compared with 33 percent of nonreligious whites. Hispanics and Asians are on the whole more affiliated with the Democratic Party than they are with the Republican Party, but "very religious Hispanics and Asians skew less Democratic and more Republican than those who are moderately religious or nonreligious."
According to Gallup, "Very religious Hispanics are more likely to identify as Democrats than as Republicans by 17 points, compared with a 30-point difference among nonreligious Hispanics." And Among Asians, "net Democratic identification rises from 12 points among the very religious to 39 points among [the] nonreligious." Blacks, however, appear to be the exception to the rule. They are "the most Democratic of the four racial and ethnic groups," and religion appears to make little or no "difference in blacks' political orientation." If anything, more religious blacks tend to affiliate as Democrats with slightly more frequency: 78 percent of very religious blacks identify as Democrats or Democratic-leaning, as compared with 74 percent of nonreligious blacks. Gallup writes on the exception: "The historical ties between blacks and the Democratic Party are so strong that they overwhelm any of the independent impact of religiousness so evident among other racial groups."
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No Longer an Urban Problem, Poverty Surges in Suburbs

2011-10-28T16:13:00.002-04:00

According to a New York Times article, more than half of those living in poverty in metropolitan areas live in suburban areas. The article lists at least nine metropolitan populations of which more than 50% live in the suburbs. Over the past ten years, these nine metropolitan areas have shifted to the majority of their poor being concentrated in the suburbs. The Detroit-Warren area has a larger share of its poor population living the the suburbs than any other metropolitan area, with 59% of its poor population living in the suburbs.

According to the article, tackling suburban poverty presents a unique set of challenges. Suburbs lack the relatively large number of social assistance programs which exist in urban areas. In addition, the lack of public transportation in suburban areas makes any social programs less accessible than they might be in urban areas.

Over the past ten years, the number of poor residents in suburbs has increased by five million. Midwestern suburbs were among those most affected. The article cites a recent analysis by the Brookings Institution to show that recently the rise in suburban poor has been the most pronounced in areas most affected by the housing collapse such as Cape Coral, Florida and Riverside, California.

Overall, a majority (55%) of the metropolitan poor now live in suburbs. Ten years ago, a little less than half (49%) of the metropolitan poor lived in the suburbs. Although growth of poverty in the suburbs has been more pronounced than in urban areas, the poverty rate in suburbs is still far below that in urban areas. In 2010, the suburban poverty rate was 11.4%. The urban poverty rate was 20.9%.

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Despite Warnings, Children's Screen Time Increases

2011-10-28T11:34:00.004-04:00

Common Sense Media released a report Tuesday showing that children younger than eight are spending more time in front of screens than ever before, according to a New York Times article. Common Sense Media, a nonprofit group based in San Francisco, found that almost half of families with annual incomes of $75,000 or more are downloading certain virtual applications geared towards their young children. However, the use of these apps is much less common in lower income families, with one in eight families with annual incomes of $30,000 or less downloading them. More than a third of low-income parents surveyed reported that they did not know what an "app" was. Common Sense Media refers to this phenomenon as the "app gap."

According to the study, half of children under eight have access to a mobile device including a smart phone, video iPod, iPad or a similar tablet. Time spent watching television is still responsible for the majority of children's time spent in front of screens; about half of children under two watch TV or DVDs on most days. These children devote, on average, two hours a day to these activities. The survey finds that children under two spend, on average, fifty-three minutes a day watching television or DVDs. The time devoted to being read to by parents was about half as long (twenty-three minutes per day).

Additionally, almost a third of children under two now have televisions in their own bedrooms. This has increased substantially over the past decade, with less than 20% of children ages six months to twenty-three months having televisions in their bedrooms in 2005. Children of families with annual incomes below $30,000 were more than three times as likely to have televisions in their bedrooms as children of families with incomes above $75,000. In families with annual incomes below $30,000, 64% of children under eight had televisions in their bedrooms. In families with annual incomes above $75,000 the portion of children under eight with televisions in their bedrooms decreased to 20%.

Even though the American Academy of Pediatricians has warned against screen time in children under two, only 14% of parents surveyed reported that their children's doctor had ever discussed media exposure with them.

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Disproportionate Number of Native American Children in Foster Care

2011-10-28T11:34:00.000-04:00

A recent report on a three-part NPR News investigation into the removal of Native American children from their families discusses the disproportionate number of Native American children in foster care, especially in South Dakota and the surrounding region. According to the article, the large Native American representation in foster care is likely the results of the financial incentive that states have to remove Native American children, as the federal government provides each state “thousands of dollars for every child it takes,”and provides greater economic incentives for Native American children. Furthermore, while states are obligated to do their best to place Native American children with relatives or tribal members according to the Indian Child Welfare Act, 90% of the Native American children in family foster care are in non-native homes or in group care. The map related to the report shows the disproportionality index, which “gauges the level at which Native American children are present in the foster care system compared with the level at which they are present in the general child population” for each state. A disproportionality index greater than 1 indicates that Native American children are overrepresented, and as the map shows, the states with the highest disproportionality indices are largely concentrated in the North West and Central North West regions of the US and include Washington, Idaho, South Dakota, Iowa and Minnesota.

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College Grads Pessimistic

2011-10-28T11:28:00.001-04:00

In one of today’s Wall Street Journal columns, David Wessel discusses the remarkable pessimism among those with a bachelor’s degree regarding the future of the US economy despite their clear economic advantage over those without bachelor’s degrees. As the first chart from the article shows, four-year college grads have lower unemployment rates than high school grads (4.2% and 9.7% respectively) and higher median weekly wages ($1,072 and $636). Despite these figures, white male 4-year college grads were actually more pessimistic about the future of the economy than the population overall, with 80% believing the U.S. economy is “going in the wrong direction” (compared with only 74% of the population overall) and 33% expecting the economy to get worse in the next 12 months (compared with only 32% of the overall population). While 4-year college grads may be better off than those holding less than a bachelor’s degree, their pessimism may not be entirely unwarranted. As the second graph from the article shows (also below), the mean income of households headed by a person with a bachelor’s degree peaked in 1999 at $99,431 (in 2010 inflation adjusted dollars) but plummeted to $90,636 last year. According to Wessel, things are worse for recent college grads, for which the unemployment rate is currently 10.7% and he goes on to express his disappointment that “having a college degree no longer guarantees a rising wage or a shot at the American dream.”

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Undergraduates Continue to Face Rising Tuition

2011-10-27T15:16:00.000-04:00

In a recent Wall Street Journal article, Kevin Helliker discusses this year’s hike in tuition for undergraduate programs. As the graph from the article (below) shows, the average tuition for in-state students at public four-year program colleges and universities increased from $7, 613 to $8,244 (8.3%) from the 2010-11 school year to the 2011-12 school year and it increased from $19,648 to $20,770 (5.7%) for out-of-state students. Tuition also climbed for public two-year in-state programs by 8.7% and for private nonprofit four-year programs by 4.5%. According to Helliker, the “the markedly quicker” increase in tuition experienced by public schools compared to that of private schools is part of a “decade-long trend” in which the price gap between the two has narrowed. While some might argue that this is placing an ill-timed burden on students and their families, Helliker points out that large increases in Pell Grants and veteran benefits and the implementation of the American Opportunity Tax Credit has substantially offset the effects of tuition increases.

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United Nations Releases Population Projections for Year 2100

2011-10-27T15:15:00.001-04:00

According to The Guardian, the world's population will reach seven billion by the end of this year. The population is predicted to reach ten billion in the next 90 years, according to the most recent release by the United Nations. The UN Population Division's analysis concludes that it will take 13 years for the population to reach eight billion. Five years later, the population is estimated to reach nine billion, and 22 years after the ninth billion citizen is born, the population is projected to reach ten billion.

Countries with high fertility rates will likely contribute substantially to these population increases. According to the United Nations, these countries include 39 countries in African, 9 in Asia, and 4 in Latin America. The United Nations identifies all European countries (with the exception of Iceland and Ireland) as low-fertility countries. According to the report, the United Nations's projections anticipate a decline in Europe's overall population by 2100. Low-fertility countries are characterized by women not having enough children to guarantee that, on average, each woman will be replaced by a daughter who lives long enough to reproduce.

China is predicted to reach its largest population in 2027 with 1.395 billion people. This population is expected to decline to 941 million by 2100. India will reach its peak population in 2062 with 1.718 billion people and will decrease to 1.6 billion by the year 2100.

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New Climate Change Data

2011-10-24T10:20:00.001-04:00

A recent article in The Economist discusses findings released October 20th by the Berkeley Earth Surface Temperature group, which includes this month's Nobel prize-winning physicist Saul Perlmutter and is led by astrophysicist Richard Muller. The group started a new climate change measurement project 18 months ago in order to "address the concerns of what Dr Muller terms 'legitimate skeptics'" of climate change who have qualms with inconsistencies in available temperature data that may exaggerate temperature changes. One way the group attempted to minimize possible exaggerating effects of inconsistencies was by developing an algorithm that weights data points in such a way that "awkward" data and "outlandish readings" are still included in the data but also don't distort the ultimate trends (as opposed to simply omitting so-called awkward data). The group also developed a "more nuanced heat map" that utilizes "basic spatial correlations in weather to estimate the temperature at points between weather stations." However, even after these innovations and addressing other possible biasing factors, the group found climate change trends similar to those published by other climate research institutions, including NASA, suggesting that existing temperature data is more or less accurate. Whether or not this will actually mitigate climate change skepticism is yet to be determined, as the newly published findings are currently being peer reviewed. The graph from the article (below) compares the land-surface average temperature anomaly measures found by the Berkeley Earth Surface Temperature Group, NASA, NOAA and Hadley CRU. As the graph shows, all sources exhibit the same general upward trend between 1800 and 2006. Furthermore, most climate research institutions, including Berkeley Earth, estimate about a 0.9 degree Celsius increase in land temperatures over the past 50 years.

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Gallup: More Americans Blame Economic Woes on Government than Wall Street

2011-10-21T10:48:00.026-04:00

A recent Gallup survey shows that Americans are far more likely to blame the federal government than Wall Street for the nation's economic problems. When asked to choose between the two, 64% of respondents say the government is more responsible for economic struggles, while only 30% blame financial institutions on Wall Street. Although Americans tend to blame the government more, as Gallup notes, "There appears to be no shortage of blame for either of these entities."

In an earlier poll, Gallup asked respondents to express their opinions on the two institutions separately, and the results were not favorable. Writes Gallup: "More than three-quarters of Americans, in both cases, say these entities deserve a great deal or a fair amount of blame for the economic problems facing the U.S." Even then, however, the federal government came out worse: "Still, reflecting the results of the forced-choice question, the percentage saying the federal government deserves a great deal of blame is 11 points higher than the percentage for financial institutions on Wall Street.Among partisan groups, Republicans are more likely (82%) to blame the federal government for the nation's economy than Democrats (49%). And while Occupy Wall Street supporters attach more responsibility to Wall Street (54%), on the other side, Tea Party supporters are far more likely to blame the government (82%).
Gallup notes: "These attitudes have significant political implications. Both the Tea Party movement, which has targeted the federal government, and the Occupy Wall Street movement, which has targeted big financial institutions, are in sync with significant segments of the U.S. population." To win political favor, it is likely that politicians who align themselves with one side more--the Tea Party or Occupy Wall Street--will have to reach across the line and appeal to voters from the other side.

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One-Word Reactions To GOP Candidates Favor Herman Cain; Perry Draws the Most Ire

2011-10-19T14:47:00.000-04:00

A recent survey that asked Americans to describe leading GOP leaders "in a single word" found that Herman Cain was viewed in the most favorable terms. Americans most frequently associated Cain with his proposed "9-9-9" tax plan, followed by his ties to business and 23 respondents who found him "interesting." Romney was most closely associated with his religion, Mormonism, and his work on health care, and Rick Perry was most often identified with his home state of Texas.

While nearly as many (12%) respondents used positive words as negative words (14%) to describe Cain, a higher percentage of respondents used negative words and not positive ones to describe both Romney (21% versus 11%) and Perry (25% versus 6%). But while the negative continued to outweigh the positive for Perry when the respondent group was limited to Republicans and GOP-leaners, with 19% using a negative word and only 9% a positive one, both Cain and Romney received more positive than negative feedback among their party's political base. Still, the support for Romney (18% positive versus 15% negative) was less impressive than that for Cain (22% versus 5%).In addition, the survey found that "many Americans are unable to come up with words to describe the three GOP candidates. Nearly half (46%) did not offer a one-word description of Cain, 44% did not offer a word to describe Perry and 37% did not have a one-word description of Romney." The survey was conducted by the Pew People & the Press and The Washington Post from October 13-16; its respondent population was 1,007 adults.

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Ryan Womack featured IASSIST member

2011-10-19T09:21:00.002-04:00

Ryan Womack, Data and Economics Librarian at Rutgers University Libraries and a member of the Outreach Team for TeachingWithData.org has been profiled as a member of the IASSIST Community, http://www.iassistdata.org/community/ryan-womack .

IASSIST, International Association of Social Science Information Services & Teachnology, is an organization of professionals working with information technology and data services to support research and teaching in the social sciences. The organization's main web page is http://www.iassistdata.org/

Fertility Rates and the Economy

2011-10-17T20:03:00.010-04:00

In a report released on October 12, the Pew Research Center presented a correlation between fertility rates and the state of the economy; when the economy began to worsen in 2008 so did fertility rates in the United States. In 2007, births were at an all-time high, with 4,316,2333 that year. Ever since, births have been declining although the overall U.S. population continues to grow.
In an analysis of individual states, the Pew Research Center found that those states with the highest levels of economic distress in 2007 and 2008 were likely to have larger drops in fertility rates from 2008 to 2009 than were less affected states. In 2007 there were 69.6 births per thousand women of childbearing age (14 to 55 years old). By 2009 this number had dropped to 66.7. Of all racial groups, Hispanics experienced the largest decline in fertility rates. Hispanics were especially hard hit by the recession in general, particularly in terms of employment and household wealth. Much of the decline in births since 2007 may be due to the decision to postpone having children. According to the Pew Research Center, people may not actually be choosing to have fewer children but may just be choosing to wait to reproduce until the economy has stabilized.
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All The Single Ladies

2011-10-17T16:13:00.005-04:00

An article published Friday in The Economist discusses the decline of the marriage rate of the black population and its implications for black women. As the below chart from the article indicates, the percentage of black adults married had decreased more rapidly than that of the white and Hispanic populations since 1970; as of 2010, the rate is down to about 40%. The article quotes Stanford professor and author of "Is Marriage for White People? How the African-American Marriage Decline Affects Everyone," who believes that a "man shortage" is at the heart of the issue. According to the article, roughly one in ten black men in their early thirties are incarcerated and black men have "fallen behind in education and income" relative to black women, with two black women graduating from college for every black man. As the group that "least intermarries with other races," black women are left with limited marital options and consequently, seven out ten are single.

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Inequality and Happiness

2011-10-16T11:28:00.007-04:00

According The Economist, the relationship between happiness and wealth inequality is more complicated than one might think. Referencing an October 12th How's Life? report by the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), the wealth inequality in a given nation has little correlation with the happiness inequality (disparity between happiest and least happy) of that nation's residents. These data suggest that residents of nations with more egalitarian wealth distribution are not necessarily more satisfied than those living in countries with high levels of wealth inequality.

The OECD report finds that, on average, well-being has increased over the past fifteen years. Possible explanations for this increase are that on average, people are less likely to be unemployed and experience better housing conditions. They also live longer and have higher educational attainment. These findings, however, are considerably varied across different countries as well as different populations. Individuals with less education and lower income scored, on average, lower on all measures of well-being examined in the report. They had shorter lives, experienced more health problems, and their children performed worse academically than the children of more educated parents with higher incomes. They also reported more exposure to crime and air pollution.

The OECD measures income distribution using the Gini index, which produces a coefficient value between 0 and 1, with 0 representing complete equality. Chile, Mexico, Turkey, and the United States have the highest levels of unequal income distribution. Nordic and Eastern European countries have a more equal distribution of income.

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Support for Death Penalty Down from Last Year, but a Majority Still Favors its Use

2011-10-13T15:51:00.019-04:00

A recent Gallup poll shows that 61 percent of Americans favor the death penalty for people convicted of murder; another 52 percent believe the dealth penalty is applied fairly through the country's criminal justice system. The approval rate represents a three percent decline from last year, when 64 percent of Americans were in favor of the penalty. According to Gallup, this year's mark indicates "the lowest level of support since 1972, the year the Supreme Court voided all existing state death penalty laws in Furman v. Georgia."

Gallup writes that views on the death penalty in murder cases have "varied substantially" over time. In 1936, the first year Gallup began asking respondents about the death penalty, "59% of Americans supported it and 38% opposed it." This was followed by "a period from the late 1950s to the early 1970s when less than a majority of Americans favored it." And "support climbed to its highest levels from the mid-1980s through the mid-1990s, including the all-time high of 80% who favored the death penalty in 1994."

The 52 percent who say they believe the penalty is applied fairly also represents a decline from last year, when the figure stood six points higher, at 58 percent. Additionally, 40 percent of Americans state the dealth penalty is not used enough, "the lowest such percentage since May 2001, when Gallup first asked this question." Further, "twenty-five percent say the death penalty is used too often, the highest such percentage yet that Gallup has measured."

Americans view the death penalty issue along strongly partisan lines. Nearly three-quarters (73%) of Republicans and Republican-leaning independents approve of the practice, as compared with 46% of Democrats and Democratic-leaning independents. Gallup writes: "Additionally, men, whites, and those living in the South and Midwest are among those most likely to support the death penalty."
Gallup conducted the poll following the controversial execution of Troy Davis, who was put to death in Georgia this past September. Politicians' stances on the death penalty may play a role in the upcoming presidential race; at a recent GOP debate, Governor Rick Perry was asked about his views on the practice--and how it is applied in his home state.

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Pew: Public Interest Rests with Economy; Limited Attention to, Coverage of Anti-Wall Street Protests

2011-10-13T11:28:00.024-04:00

With the public most interested in tracking changes in economic conditions, the recent Wall Street protests have not received much attention--or interest--from people or news organizations. This according to the Pew Research Center for the People & the Press, which conducts a weekly survey called the News Interest Index "aimed at gauging the public’s interest in and reaction to major news events."

Over a quarter of respondents (27%) report that their top story last week was the economy. The Wall Street protests came in sixth (7%), also trailing interest in Steve Jobs (14%); the 2012 elections (12%); Amanda Knox (10%); and Afghanistan (8%). Although the percentage of total news coverage dedicated to the economy trailed interest, checking in at only 15%, the amount of coverage on Occupy Wall Street exactly matched news interest, at 7%.

When respondents were asked which news stories they followed very closely last week, the results were similarly slanted toward the economy. 43% say they followed economic news very closely, as compared with only 17% who say the same of Occupy Wall Street protests. Interest in Occupy Wall Street appears especially weak when compared with interest in the Tea Party in April 2009. Only "17% say they are following the current protests very closely, compared with 27% who followed early Tea Party protests very closely." Nor is there the same partisan disparity as there was with regard to the Tea Party. Back in April 2009, 43% of Republicans followed the Tea Party news very closely, compared with only 18% of Democrats. But interest in Occupy Wall Street is low across all partisan groups, with only 12% of Republicans; 17% of Democrats; and 19% of independents following the story very closely.
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Most Top Research Universities Still In US

2011-10-11T14:41:00.000-04:00

Catherine Rampell discusses new data released from the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development in her recent New York Times "Economix" blog. The graph (right), based on the OECD data, shows the geographic distribution of the world's "University hotspots," or top 50 research Universities across a broad range of disciplines (as ranked by the OECD). Interestingly, US Universities made up the smallest number of hotspots in the Social Sciences out of all of the disciplines, as it was the only discipline in which US Universities made up less than a majority of the hotspots. US Universities accounted for the largest amount of hotspots in the disciplines of Chemistry and Computer Science, in which they accounted for close to 40 out of 50 hotspots. Across all departments, US Universities accounted for 80% of hotspots. While this may paint a favorable picture of American Universities, Rampell suggests that the future of American dominance in Research may be less certain, as a relatively small number of US residents hold doctorate agrees and many students attending American doctorate programs are from abroad.
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In Bad Economy, More Family Members Under One Roof

2011-10-10T10:45:00.000-04:00

According to a report released by the Pew Research Center, the recession beginning in 2007 spurred Americans to move in with relatives. From 2007 to 2009, the number of Americans living in multi-generational households surged from 46.5 million to 51.4 million. The population living in multi-generational households climbed by 10.5% from 2007 to 2009. In 2007, 15.4% of the population lived in multi-generational households, whereas 16.7% did two years later. Multi-generational households are defined as house holds with a) two adult generations: parents and adult children ages 25 and older, b) three generations, c) skipped generations (grandparents and grandchildren, without parents) or d) more than three generations. In 2009, more than 10% of households in the United States were multi-generational; most multi-generational households consisted of two adult generations.

Although income levels for multi-generational households, when adjusted for household size, are lower than other households, the poverty rate among residents of multi-generational households is significantly smaller than for those in other household types. In 2009 the poverty rate was 11.5% for Americans in multi-generational households and 14.6% in other households.The report also finds that groups hardest hit by the recession may stand to benefit the most from multi-generational living. These groups include unemployed Americans, young adults, hispanics, and blacks. Whereas the poverty rate for unemployed Americans living in multi-generational households was 17.5% in 2009, the rate was substantially higher for Americans in other households, at 30.3%.

Often referred to as the "boomerang generation," today's young adults have increasingly moved back in with parents after living independently. A quarter of young adults ages 18 to 24 moved back in with their parents during the recession. The report attributes this to the high rate of unemployment in young adults during the recession.

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Data Gone Wrong: Chart on Debt Increases

2011-10-07T15:18:00.009-04:00

In one of last week's Washington Post "Fact Checker" blogs, Glenn Kessler gives a rather scathing review of a chart (above) created by the office of House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi in May. The chart, based on data but not calculations made by the US Treasury Department, has gained attention in social media. As pointed out by Politifact and subsequently corrected by Pelosi's office, the original chart included a major math error by calculating debt increases as if Obama had taken office a year later than he did, cutting his actual debt increase by more than a half and increasing George W. Bush's significantly. Despite Politifact drawing attention to the error and the correction, the original chart is still being proliferated according to Kessler, who saw it in his Facebook "newsfeed" recently.

In addition to this more obvious error, Kessler points out the misleading nature of percent changes in raw debt figures - because Obama was faced with a substantially higher debt when he came into office than his predecessors, it would have taken a much greater nominal increase in the debt to achieve the same percentage increases. Kessler also points out use of gross debt measures rather than public debt measures. Although not technically "misleading," it is worth noting that had the chart used public debt figures rather than gross debt figures, Obama and George W. Bush would have had nearly the same debt increases (60% and 70% respectively) despite Bush's longer term. On his Pinocchio standard, which rates claims made by political figures or groups in fact-checking, Kessler gave Pelosi's chart "Four Pinocchios," which is reserved only for true "whoppers."

Kessler suggests that the debt increase as a percentage of gross domestic product as a more economically informative measure and, using White House Budget Office Historical Tables, calculated the following figures for each President:Although these figures are less flattering for Obama, Kessler notes that he is "battling a recession."

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Private Employers Add Jobs in September But Do Little to Alleviate Concerns About Economy; Heavy Losses in Public Education

2011-10-07T14:07:00.015-04:00

The U.S. Labor Department published its September employment report Friday, and although it showed that the private sector added 137,000 jobs in the month, concerns about the economy remain. The unemployment rate was unchanged at 9.1 percent and as the New York Times comments,"While the number of new jobs exceeded consensus forecasts, it was barely enough to accommodate population growth, much less help those who have been out of work for an extended period." The number of jobs added was also inflated due to the return of 45,000 Verizon employees who had been striking in August. The ranks of the unemployed are still large, and they include many people who have faced long-term unemployment: "there are still 14 million people searching for work, a little less than half of them for six months or longer," the Times writes. And with the housing market "still teetering" and the public sector hurting, there is plenty to worry about in the report. Local government cut 35,000 jobs in September, 24,400 of which were in public education. The president of the American Federation of Teachers, Randi Weingarten, told the Times that 277,000 education jobs had been cut since 2008--and that she expects another 280,000 to go in the next year.

There were, however, other positive signs in the report. For one, according to the Times, "the government...revised its estimates upward for the previous two months, suggesting that job growth in July and August had been better than originally reported." It "reported net gains of 127,000 and 57,000 jobs in July and August, respectively, an increase from the originally released numbers."

Further, auto sales increased nearly ten percent, reaching their highest level in five months; and sales at chain stores, led by luxury goods, also saw an increase in September. Also encouraging, the economy began to chip away at the consumer confidence lows that had been reported in recent months. The health care industry added 44,000 employees; employment and business services 48,000; and the information industry added 34,000 jobs in the month.

As President Obama continues his efforts to get Congress to pass his proposed jobs bill, both parties will likely try and use new data to convince the public that their economic approach is the right one. Senator Eric Cantor has already seized on the newest opportunity, responding to Friday's release by saying: "Unfortunately, the policies being promoted by this administration are serving as a roadblock to growth. Constant threats of tax increases and excessive regulations send the wrong signal to our entrepreneurs, investors and small business people."

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Data Shows Large Decline in Domestic Airfares

2011-10-07T12:22:00.000-04:00

In a recent Wall Street Journal article, Susan Carey discusses the steady decline in domestic airfares over the last several decades and the implications for the airline industry. According to the Transportation Department, domestic airfares (adjusted for inflation) have fallen 16% since 1995. AMR Corp.'s American Airlines, which Casey refers to as "the weakest of the major airlines," is in the most financial peril with its stock price having collapsed Monday. Carey blames the 33% loss in value to investor fears that the company might soon have to file for bankruptcy-court protection. She also discusses the general difficulties plaguing the airline industry as a whole, including enormous expenses and external shocks from "terrorism, oil-price spikes, waning consumer confidence and high taxes." Airlines have attempted to compensate for the declining airfares and rising costs by increasing fees for amenities such as in-flight food and checked luggage. However, as the graph below shows, airfares have declined despite these new fees. The graph, based on data from the Air Transport Association, shows a sharp decline over the last 30 years in average round-trip amount for domestic flights and includes reservation change fees or baggage fees in addition to the fare (in 2010 inflation adjusted dollars). Rather than create new fees to help cover costs in the face of declining prices, Jeff Smisek, the chief executive of United Continental, believes that "professional management, as opposed to more charismatic, cowboy management" may be the answer.
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The Hispanic Vote in 2012

2011-10-03T15:55:00.000-04:00

In a recent Wall Street Journal article, Jonathon Weisman discusses the potentially decisive role Hispanics may play in the 2012 elections, as Census data shows large increases in the voting-age Hispanic population in several swing states. According to the data, Florida saw a growth of nearly 250,000 in the Hispanic voting-age population from 2008 to 2010 while the growth of the voting-age white population was only 30,400.The growth in the voting-age Hispanic population also outpaced that of the voting-age white population in Nevada, with a 44,000 increase in Hispanics of voting-age and an 18,000 increase in whites of voting-age, and in New Mexico, with a 36,000 and 19,000 respective increase. The chart from the article shows the growth in White and Hispanic eligible voters in 7 key states, including Florida, Nevada and New Mexico, and their 2008 votes. As the chart indicates, Obama won all of the states except for Missouri but the Hispanic population has increased substantially relative to whites in each of the states since the 2008 election, with the highest percent increase in Hispanics eligible to vote in North Carolina, at 39.1%. Both parties are already making efforts to win the Hispanic vote in the 2012 election. According to Weisman, Obama conducted an online roundtable on Hispanic issues yesterday while GOP affiliated groups, such as American Crossroads, have been running both televised and radio ads in Spanish. Weisman also points out that while Obama won two-thirds percent of Hispanic votes nationwide in the 2008 election, his administration may have lost some Hispanic voters with high Hispanic unemployment rate relative to the national unemployment rate, failure to deliver on promises of an immigration law overhaul, and the Department of Homeland Security’s 1 million deportations of illegal immigrants during his term so far.

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With Revenues Down, Lawmakers Look to Alcohol

2011-10-03T12:29:00.001-04:00

The New York Times recognized a new strategy among state and city governments trying to raise revenues during the economic recession: target alcohol. They write: "Since the recession started in earnest in 2008, dozens of states and cities have tinkered with laws that regulate alcohol sales as a way to build up their budgets."

Changes to existing laws have ranged from raising taxes on alcohol to trying to make it available on days it has traditionally not been sold, with a lot of tactics falling in between. According to the Times: "Twelve states have raised taxes on alcohol or changed alcohol laws to increase revenue, including Maryland, which in July pushed the sales tax on alcohol to 9 percent, from 6 percent — the first such increase in 38 years and one that is expected to bring in $85 million a year." And "in November, voters in Atlanta and elsewhere in Georgia will decide whether to repeal colonial-era laws that ban alcohol sales on Sunday."

Some of the changes to laws appear relatively small, yet governments still hope to bring in new revenue. Take Tennessee for example: "People touring the Jack Daniel’s distillery in Lynchburg, Tenn., may finally be able to have a sip now that the state has loosened laws to allow tastings as part of a package of changes intended to attract more alcohol-related business to the state."

And it is not just government hoping to bring in more revenue from changes to alcohol law. In Louisiana, universities are joining the crowd: "Fans of the Louisiana State University Tigers will soon be drinking Bandit Blonde...The university will get royalties of between 6 and 8 percent, said Charles D’Agostino, executive director of the university’s Louisiana Business and Technology Center."

Until the recession, alcohol revenue had been a growing industry; today, "the nation’s states and local governments take in $17 billion year from alcohol taxes."

What does the Times have to say about new developments in alcohol law?
"Drink up, America. The government needs the money."

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