- How do you define a resident of the U.S. for the Census?
- How do you define who is employed and who is not?
- Hospitals measure the severity of diseases differently, making
collecting national data difficult.
- Comparing crime rates across time is difficult because
standards and procedures for recording crimes change.
- The answers given in interviews depends on the race of the
interviewer, especially when the questions are about racial equality.
- The result of a census depends on the purpose of the census.
For military draft and taxation in China: 28 million,
for famine relief: 105 million.
- Literary Digest's Prediction of the 1936 Roosevelt vs. Landon
election.
- In WW2, 405 thousand people died from accidents at home, while
375 thousand people died on the front lines.
- Joe Twinklebat is batting .750. Are you impressed?
- Out of 20 interviewees, only 13% are happy at their jobs.
What is wrong?
- Any time you hear reports about the average income
in a certain subpopulation, the median should probably be used
instead.
- Use the the median to describe a population with a nonsymmetric
histogram (larger tail in one direction than in another).
- Beware of graphs that only show part of the range of
the dependent variable.
Salaries go through the roof:
Salaries barely increase:
- Does Brand X mouthwash cure sore throats?
It kills 5 million bacteria per second in laboratory tests.
- Brand Z juicers extract 26% more juice.
- Compound W causes cancer in laboratory mice.