Wednesday, May 14, 2008
Nonsense ‘Survey’ Says Americans ‘Struggling in Life’
How about I ask you if you “feel” like you make enough money each year? Let’s say you make $48,000 a year, OK? (That’s the median household income in the US) You’ll likely tell me, then that you “feel” you need more. Now, from this, can I conclude that you are “struggling in life” as a citizen of the USA? Not if you use actual data instead of “feelings” to determine what “struggling” means and not if you then try to add context to what we all have compared to what others in the world have, of course. But, this is exactly the sort of nonsensical “survey” that Reuters gravely warned us about this week. Without bothering with any statistics or context, Reuters excitedly reported that “Many Americans struggling in life, survey finds"(1), and decided that everyone is downtrodden and filled with “suffering” in the United States today. More...

