August 6, 2012
Stat of the Week Competition: August 4 – 10 2012
Each week, we would like to invite readers of Stats Chat to submit nominations for our Stat of the Week competition and be in with the chance to win an iTunes voucher.
Here’s how it works:
- Anyone may add a comment on this post to nominate their Stat of the Week candidate before midday Friday August 10 2012.
- Statistics can be bad, exemplary or fascinating.
- The statistic must be in the NZ media during the period of August 4 – 10 2012 inclusive.
- Quote the statistic, when and where it was published and tell us why it should be our Stat of the Week.
Next Monday at midday we’ll announce the winner of this week’s Stat of the Week competition, and start a new one.
The fine print:
- Judging will be conducted by the blog moderator in liaison with staff at the Department of Statistics, The University of Auckland.
- The judges’ decision will be final.
- The judges can decide not to award a prize if they do not believe a suitable statistic has been posted in the preceeding week.
- Only the first nomination of any individual example of a statistic used in the NZ media will qualify for the competition.
- Employees (other than student employees) of the Statistics department at the University of Auckland are not eligible to win.
- The person posting the winning entry will receive a $20 iTunes voucher.
- The blog moderator will contact the winner via their notified email address and advise the details of the $20 iTunes voucher to that same email address.
- The competition will commence Monday 8 August 2011 and continue until cancellation is notified on the blog.
Rachel Cunliffe is the co-director of CensusAtSchool and currently consults for the Department of Statistics. Her interests include statistical literacy, social media and blogging. See all posts by Rachel Cunliffe »
Statistic: “67 Maori children died avoidable deaths every year, costing taxpayers $200 million annually.”
Source: Stuff.co.nz
Date: 05/08/2012
The original study says that the social costs of health disparities ranges from $62m-$200m, including measures of the value of statistical lives lost among Maori children. In no way is the larger figure close to a “Cost to the taxpayer” except in the odd sense that costs borne by the parents who cared about those children are included in the value of statistical lives lost and some of those parents may have been taxpayers.
Another case of “Economic Impact” or “Social cost” turning into “cost to the taxpayer” when handled by journalists.
Discussed at length:
http://www.tvhe.co.nz/2012/08/06/journalist-ideological-cant-read/
http://www.offsettingbehaviour.blogspot.co.nz/2012/08/i-hate-economic-impact-numbers.html
12 years ago
Statistic: Moata’s Blog Idle break down of Vogel’s bread carb ‘reduction’:
http://www.stuff.co.nz/life-style/blogs/moatas-blog-idle/7396263/The-best-thing-since-sliced-bread
Complete with tricky graph
Source: http://www.stuff.co.nz/life-style/blogs/moatas-blog-idle/7396263/The-best-thing-since-sliced-bread
Date: 02/08/12
Made me laugh
12 years ago
Statistic: Probably just an error, but I got a laugh out of this. It might be fixed by the time you get to it.
“Thirty-one per cent of migrants were between the ages of 25 and 29, while 24 per cent were between the ages of 25 and 29.”
Source: Fairfax NZ News
Date: 10/8/2012
12 years ago
[…] to Eric Crampton for his nomination of an absolute shocker of a statistic this week. The printed story completely […]
12 years ago