Harper’s Index

Chance that a democratic national election held last year was marred by violence or a disputed outcome: 1 in 4¹

Chance that an election held in 1999 had such problems: 1 in 5²

Ratio of the insurance industry's U.S. political contributions last year to those of the legal profession: 2:5³

Rank of the Democratic Party and Nike, respectively, among sixty brand names tested for customer loyalty in 1999: 53, 4⁴

Rank of the Republican Party: 60⁵

Average number of brand-name items requested per shopping trip by a U.S. child between the ages of four and twelve: 14⁶

Weeks that a Massachusetts school prohibited a boy from cross-dressing last fall before a judge overturned the ban: 13⁷

Number of Hooters girls who visited a teenage leukemia patient in a Philadelphia hospital last fall at his request: 3⁸

Estimated number of minors held in U.S. prisons in 1998 without segregation from adult inmates: 3,700⁹

Number of Floridian ex-cons denied the right to vote last November because of felony convictions: 525,000¹⁰

Number of times a Floridian can be convicted of DUI before the infraction becomes a felony: 3¹¹

Minimum number of limo rides illegally charged to the U.S. Postal Service by nine of its executives since June 1996: 520¹²

Pages of documents related to racial profiling by New Jersey State Police released by the state last year: 91,000¹³

Pages of Haitian government documents that the United States has held since seizing them from the country in 1994: 160,000¹⁴

Number of years after fleeing Haiti in 1995 that death-squad leader Toto Constant was selling real estate in New York City: 5¹⁵

Estimated amount of Colombian drug money laundered each year via purchases of U.S. goods and services: $3,000,000,000¹⁶

Amount this represents as a percentage of U.S. military aid pledged to Colombia last year: 578¹⁷

Estimated percentage of U.S. Army troops deployed in Bosnia who will be replaced by National Guardsmen in 2002: 50¹⁸

Year in which Colin Powell complained, "I'm running out of villains. I'm down to Castro and Kim Il Sung": 1991¹⁹

Year in which the maker of genetically engineered StarLink corn promised the EPA it would be fed only to animals: 1998²⁰

Estimated percentage of the U.S. corn supply now contaminated with genetically engineered StarLink corn: 20²¹

Ratio of the number of people who died of famine in North Korea since 1993 to the current population of its capital: 1:3²²

Minimum annual "baby bonus" that the government of Singapore pays couples who have a second child: $500²³

Maximum number of people who may legally congregate outdoors in Burma without government authorization: 5²⁴

Number of poets scheduled to attend a literary conference in China last year before the government banned it: 200²⁵

Number of "prefectures...east of the mountains...growing nothing but thorns," according to poet Tu Fu: 200²⁶

Percentage change since 1987 in the jellyfish population off Louisiana's coast: +400²⁷

Chances that an Alabama voter voted against legalizing marriage between blacks and whites last November: 2 in 5²⁸

Chances that a young black man living in Los Angeles's Watts neighborhood is unemployed or in prison: 7 in 10²⁹

Number of Catholics who received penance at a weekend-long "confess-a-thon" held in Washington, D.C., last fall: 22,000³⁰

Percentage change in the annual number of Roman Catholic priests ordained in Brooklyn and Queens since 1980: -92³¹

Percentage of doctors at a New York City hospital who report often not knowing the cost of the drugs they prescribe: 80³²

Chance that a patient given a placebo in one impotence-drug trial reported an erection: 1 in 3³³

Score shouted by Justice Antonin Scalia at a Washington, D.C., tennis court in 1998 before claiming victory: "5-4!"³⁴

Percentage of women who chose Al Gore or George Bush from among last year's presidential nominees to be their valentine: 40³⁵

Percentage who refused to choose: 44³⁶

Rank of assertiveness among qualities the American Psychological Association cites as most common to great presidents: 6³⁷

Rank of intellectual brilliance: 1³⁸

Number of articles published since 1998 containing the words "George W. Bush" and "aura of inevitability": 350³⁹

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