Factoids

1990 Number of U.S. births to mothers under 20: 533,000 Number of U.S. births to mothers over 35: 368,000 2008 Number of U.S. births to mothers under 20: 441,000 Number of U.S. births to mothers over 35: 603,000 Yes, according to the Pew Research Center and reported in today’s Washington Post, in the U.S. there […]

“For the first time, marketers spent more in 2009 on Internet advertising than in magazines, according to a report from ZenithOptimedia, which said online ad spending would rapidly close ground on newspapers.” (Source: NY Times, 4/26/10)

The New York Times, in an excellent piece about why “the next big thing is small, cheap and not American,” offers this stunner about the ubiquity of cell phones across the globe: “The number of mobile subscriptions in the world is expected to pass five billion this year, according to the International Telecommunication Union, a […]

The folks over at Challenger Gray & Christmas have taken a look at what happens in the workplace when people are lured into the force field that is the NCAA basketball tournament. The results? They estimate that during the first week of the tournament alone, workers distracted by March Madness (and that includes you, Mr. […]

“In 2007, 47 percent of Harvard grads went into finance or consulting.” (Source: David Brooks, “The Power Elite,” NY Times, 02.18.10) BONUS! Quote of the day from the same column: “The meritocracy is based on an overly narrow definition of talent. Our system rewards those who can amass technical knowledge. But this skill is only […]

In 2007, American women earned about 166 associates degrees and 135 bachelor’s degrees for every 100 earned by men. Among African-Americans, women earned 219 associate’s degrees and 192 bachelor’s degrees for every 100 earned by men. (Source: WSJ via Dep’t of Education, 2/12/10)

“According to an operational study of National Football League teams prepared for The Wall Street Journal by Boston Consulting Group, the typical NFL season requires 514,000 hours of labor per team. That’s about eight times the effort it took to conceptualize, build and market Apple’s iPod, according to BCG, and enough time to build 25 […]

“According to Julia Isaacs of the Brookings Institution, the (U.S.) federal government now spends $7 on the elderly for every $1 it spends on children.” (Source: NY Times, 2/2/10)

“For the first time in American history,” today’s New York Times reports, “a majority of union members are government workers rather than private-sector employees.” Last year, the U.S. had 7.9 million unionized workers in the public sector and 7.4 million in private industry. Only 7. 2 percent of the private sector workforce belongs to a labor union, […]

“The U.S. government estimates that the cultivation and trafficking of illegal drugs directly employs 450,000 people in Mexico. Unknown numbers of people, possibly in the millions, are indirectly linked to the drug industry, which has revenues estimated to be as high as $25 billion a year, exceeded only by Mexico’s annual income from manufacturing and […]