When good toys go bad

United Press International says:

BETHESDA, Md., June 19 (UPI) — One in every 24 kinds of toys recalled for safety reasons in the United States was manufactured in China, a fact U.S. regulators and parents call alarming

Simply shocking. Those lousy Chinese, who couldn't care less about
the safety of our children. Those other 23 toys that are recalled
were probably just harmless safety recalls----nothing to worry about.
But, 1 in 24.....that's a lot.

The New York Times article As More Toys Are Recalled, Trail Ends in China, has the correct statistic.

China manufactured every one of the 24 kinds of toys recalled for safety reasons in the United States so far this year...

The correctly statistic is much more alarming than original quote.

Why Parents Worry

So Newsweek had these interesting tidbits in the magazine pages this week:

22% of parents say their greatest concern regarding their college-age child is health and safety.
20% say that the issue troubling them the most is their college-age child's performance in school.
18% of parents report that career planning is their biggest worry about their college student.

Their source is cited as: "Based on Univerisity of Minnesota's Parent Survey."

The first thing to think about here is the wording is all confusing, because one would hope that these three statistics would be related (they all are placed in their own blue box on the page). And yet, the first number speaks of their "college-age" child, who may or may not be in college. I have no survey to back this up, but I will guess that 22% of parents are concerned about the health and safety of their any-age child. The second one seems to tell me that of all the troubles parents have in their lives, they think the most about their college-age childs performance in school. And the last reports that they worry about career planning when they think about their college student. At least this child is definitely in college. However, are the parents planning the career or the students?

Secondly, where are these statistics coming from? An online survey of course! Given by the UMinnesota Parents and can be seen here. January 2006 was when they did the survey. Here are those results:

This year, what has been your greatest concern regarding your student's University experience?
114 said academics
115 said health/safety
82 said finances
96 said career planning
27 said campus involvement
70 said time management
66 said personal relationships
14 said other

Note that 114 and 115 are almost the same, so let's run the numbers. The total people surveyed was 584. 114/584=19.52%... almost 20%. 115/584=19=19.69%, not that close to 22%, huh? But if you add in the people who marked other... 14+115=129 and 129/584=22.08%. Who knows where Newsweek actually got that percentage, or what they're trying to prove, but something is fishy here. And this is before it even started getting analyzed. Percentages aren't exactly rocket science.

And on my last note, who are these parents? The ones sending their kid to a four year state college. Thats a pretty small parent sample. What about all the parents who send their kids to elite private schools? Or two-year community colleges? Or no school? etc.

For future reference, this was the May 22, 2006 edition of Newsweek, page 57.

More on smoking your car.

OK, so the idea is to cover statistics here, not morals. It's up to every individual to make choices based on the incredible amount of "data" he/she processes every day. The problem is, every story has several sides, the proponents of which each have their own bias to serve up. Each side can (and usually does) manipulate the statistical numbers in such a way to portray their arguments in the best light possible.

In the previous entry, the car alliance stated "99% cleaner than you think." Now if you consider the questions they could have asked, you will realize that such a statement is far from useful, and difficult to make accurately. How clean do you think your car is? In what units? How do they know? Was it a multiple-choice question or a write-in? Did they even do a poll? Did they just ask 10 people in their office? Are they comparing the average thought to the average car, or simply comparing your own thought to your own car and averaging that?

Carfree times stated "If today's cars are virtually emission free...then so is this cigarette." Although both cigarettes and cars are well known to spew toxins known to cause cancer, the two are not comparable. It is entirely possible to have emission-free cars, but the current-day cigarettes would still be just as cancer-causing. Similarly, perhaps cigarettes will one day be toxin free, but modern cars might still be pollution-spewing beast. Perhaps a bit tongue-in-cheek, the data citation references the auto alliance as the source.

Here are both ads, transcribed:

Autos manufactured today are virtually emission free. And that's a dramatic improvement over models from just thirty years ago. So if you want to know what it really means to drive a clean car, look beyond the back seat. Se what's under the hood of every new car and light truck we make.

Find out more about ultra-clean vehicles at autoalliance.org.

AND

Automakers are trying to deceive you about vehicle pollution, claiming that, "Autos manufactured today are virtually emission-free."*

Seems they're ignoring the fact that new vehicles actually produce more global warming emissions than they did 20 years ago. In fact only four nations on earth produce more heat-trapping, carbon dioxide than U.S. autos do alone. And even under tighter government standards, autos will still emit 500,000 tons of smog-forming pollutants and 350,000 tons of smog-forming pollutants and 350,000 tons of toxins linked to cancer. †

Rather than using their lobbyists -- the Alliance of Automobile Manufacturers -- to spread disinformation, automakers should put their talented engineers to work in support of federal and state initiatives that clean our air and protect our kids.

Warning: Global warming pollution from automobiles is projected to lead to worsening smog, an increase in asthma-triggering pollen and molds, and a substantial rise in heat-related illness and death.

* Alliance of Automobile Manufacturers ad originally published in Congress Daily, January 24, 2005.
† Projected annual smog-forming emissions if every passenger vehicle on the road in 2009 met Tier 2 standards. Toxic emissions are EPA projected values for 2020 expressed as benzene equivalent values based on relative cancer unit risks.

There has to be a first post

98.2% of bloggers have a first post. Sometimes, people just make the site, and forget their username before they even finish setting up. We have a name for those: quitters. And you know what they say? 100% of former smokers are quitters.



I got this from Carfree Times which has all kinds of car news. This image definitely makes you think twice before buying a Ford Explorer Eddie Bauer Edition to carry around your 9 month old son. Oh, and the weekly groceries.

Ah, but the Alliance of Automobile Manufacturers states that "today's vehicles are 99% cleaner than vehicles of the 1970s, thanks to a dramatic reduction in smog-forming emissions."


Who knows which side is right. Certainly they are arguing with a different set of data points. A different collection of statistics. And they are hashing them out to make their point seem true to you. 99% cleaner than "you think" is an interesting play on words. But so is the nearly irrelevant comparrison to cigarettes on the other side, with no data at all to back up that claim.