Quotes of the day

... regression analysis shows that two very important variables are the total population and per capita incomes of different countries. Also important are whether a country has an authoritarian government-such as communism- a country's climate, and whether a country is the host country for a particular Olympics. These five variables taken together predict closely the total number of medals won by different countries in the winter as well as summer Games.--Gary Becker

An international comparison shows that the time needed for doubling per capita GDP is 58 years in England during the period of 1780-1838, 47 years in the United States during 1839-1886, 34 years in Japan during 1885-1919, and 11 years in Korea during 1966-1977. China has set a new record--per capita GDP in China doubled within only 9 years between 1978 and 1987, and doubled again in another 9 years between 1987 and 1996.--Growthology

High school cheerleading accounted for 65.1 percent of all catastrophic sports injuries among high school females over the past 25 years.--LiveScience

... the Normal Retirement Age for Social Security in 2004 would have to be at least 71 (using lowest number in the table) and more likely 73 or 74 (using the gender blended results from Methods 1 and 2) in order to be consistent with the real age of 65 in 1935. Using the same logic, the age of Medicare eligibility would have needed to have been advanced by at least five years. Such adjustments would be politically difficult, but age inflation and the lack of adjusting for it has quite a bit to do with the solvency problems of Social Security and Medicare.--John B. Shoven and Gopi Shah Goda

The New York Times practically dry humps the leg of DeBeers. Suspicious.--Chris Blattman

... the Furman-Goolsbee piece seems to take a surprising step away from bipartisanship. They take a swipe at Senator McCain's proposal to replace the tax exclusion for employer-provided health insurance with a more flexible health insurance credit. When President Bush suggested a similar idea last year, Furman and coauthors called it "a step in the right direction," and many other commentators agreed. It is too bad that Team Obama is now dissing the proposal.--Greg Mankiw