End justifies the means

"There is a deep strain in the American psyche that the end justifies the means" - quote from David Callahan, the author of "The Cheating Culture''.

1/2 of the randomly selected journalists surveyed by the Northwestern U. say they have seen unethical behavior in the newsroom.

Although U.S. companies spend annually on R&D $194 billions dollars, they spend $205 billion annually on tort litigation.

A recent Gallup survey reports that 70% of public high school students admit to serious test cheating.

According to a recent survey covering 5,331 students at 32 graduate business schools in the U.S. and Canada, 56% of business students were willing to own up to cheating (and who knows how many of them lied about that?).

Source - Reader Digest (Oct. 2006)

The internet is sick ?

Every day, there are 171 billions of email messages sent out; 71% of all email classified as spam; 61% of PCs infested with spyware or adware.

Source: Popular Science, Oct, 2006.

Excess weight reduces men's fertility

Obese men are more likely to be infertile than their slimmer peers, according to the first study to look at whether a man's weight influences a couple's fertility (Epidemiology, Sept. 2006).

Researcher found for every excess 10 kilograms, or 20 pounds, may cut a man's fertility by 10%.

There are a number of mechanisms by which being overweight could affect fertility in males. For example, excess weight may reduce sperm concentration/count, alter hormonal balance and increase scrotal temperature, or overweight men may simply have lower libidos and less sex than normal-weight men.

We have have more TVs than people

According to Nielsen Media Research, on average in US, there are 2.73 TV sets in the typical home and 2.55 people.

The average person watches 4 hours, 35 minutes of television each day. Young people aged 12 to 17 watched 3% more television during the season that ended in May than they had the previous year.

Midlife divorce increases heart disease for women but not men

Based on several thousand cases beginning at age 51, researchers calculated that by age 60, women who were divorced, remarried, or widowed were nearly 50% more likely to have cardiovascular disease than women who stayed married".

No such difference was seen for men. In fact, men who remarried were actually 19% less likely to develop heart disease than those who had stayed married to the same person. The researchers conclude that "emotional distress and socioeconomic status" cause the harm to women.

What is the most expensive year of life ?

Being 34 years old is considered the most expensive age, according to a recent UK survey.

Around average age of 34, "buying property and home improvements were the biggest expenditures, with weddings, babies and cars also adding to financial pressures".

How much fish do we eat ?

According to John Connelly, the President of the US National Fisheries institute, in 2004, Americans consumed a record 16.6 pounds of seafood per capita.

Your conscience really can be wiped clean

Here is an interesting observations - in an experiment, participants asked to recall a recent unethical deed they had committed; people who recalled an unethical deed were more likely than participants who recalled an ethical deed (67% vs.33%), to choose an antiseptic wipe as a free gift rather than a pencil. It seems physical cleansing can actually clear our moral conscience.

A different set of participants were again asked to describe something unethical they had done in the past. Some of them were then offered an antiseptic wipe to clean their hands. Next, all the participants were asked to volunteer to help a research student who desperately needed participants. Remarkably, fewer of the participants who’d wiped their hands clean volunteered – 41% of them did compared with 74% of the participants who hadn’t cleaned their hands. Apparently, their moral stains having been washed away, the participants who’d cleaned their hands subsequently felt less of a compulsion to compensate for their previous unethical deed.

Who double-dip chips ?

According to American Dietetic Association, 46% of men and 31% of women admit to double-dipping chips at parties.

Heard from radio today

Only 3% of U.S. population say they trust Congress;

Only 20% of U.S. male under 30 years old are married;

Source: NPR (9/15/2006)

U.S. population - there is less elbowroom

Sometime next month, Oct. 2006, the Census Bureau predicts, the U.S. population will top 300 million. That's nearly double the number of people who called this country home just 50 years ago. Experts see the population approaching 400 million by 2040.

One country, different life expectancy

Although we live in the same country (US), where we live, combined with our race and income, plays a huge role in the nation's mortality disparities. For example, the life expectancy gap between 3.4 million high-risk urban black males and the 5.6 million Asian female was 20.7 years in 2001. In general, life expectancy is higher among Americans living in the rural Northern Plains, while rates are much lower in the South.

How much do you pay for one extra year of your life?

Medical spending does extend life.

A study published an New England Journal of Medicine (Aug, 2006) calculated that Americans of all ages spent an average of $19,900 on medical care for each extra year of life expectancy gained over the last four decades of the 20th century.

The researchers measured value by the cost of care that extends the average person's life by one year. The $19,900 spent for each extra year of life -- when averaged over 40 years -- would be widely considered a reasonable value. Many public and private insurers routinely pay for treatments that cost up to roughly $100,000 for each additional year of life.

Tall people earn more

It is been know for some time that tall people earn more, each additional inch of height adds roughly 2% to average annual earnings, for both men and women. In a new study, two scientists from Princeton University, find that tall people earn more, because they're smarter, on average. It is possible that early childhood care, including prenatal care, can increase both height and cognitive ability.

Those who attempt suicide rather than just thinking about it

A recent survey in UK showing that people who said they had thought about taking their own life in the last year, just under 10% reported that they had made an attempt on their life.

The researchers found those individuals who had actually attempted suicide, rather than just thinking about it, were more likely to have serious ill-health, to be unemployed and to have poor relationships with their friends and family. And these factors had a cumulative effect – aparticipant with two of these factors was 3 times more likely tohave attempted suicide; someone with all three factors was 11 times morelikely to have made an attempt.

Surprisingly perhaps, rates of self-reported depression and anxiety were no greater among the suicide attempters than among those who only thought about suicide.

Who need a vacation ?

Although average American gets a little less than 4 weeks of paid time off, including public holidays, compared with 7.9 weeks for Italians and 6.6 weeks for Britons, two surveys find 40% of Americans have no summer vacation plans, the highest in about three decades. The reasons? Some people have no paid vacations, others simple can't live without working.

The median hourly wage for American workers

"The median hourly wage for American workers has declined 2% since 2003," reports the New York Times. "As a result, wages and salaries now make up the lowest share of the nation’s gross domestic product since the government began recording the data in 1947, while corporate profits have climbed to their highest share since the 1960’s."

See also this post.