Apples with apples

Okay, I have no professional training in stats.  I have had an interest in them over the years, and have done some reading, and worked with stats for three years before I retired.   All still in a fairly non-academic way.

But it really irritates me when news reports use stats to make a case without comparing apples with apples.

Let me be clear.  I suspect there is a considerable disparity between the rich and the poor in New Zealand, perhaps (and I use that word advisedly) more than in the past.  But I don't have actual figures to prove this.  And nor, it seems to me, does Lane Nichols in his article on Stuff.co. nz entitled Revealing the gap between NZ's rich and poor.  He throws a number of 'stats' around, but do they make the case he's claiming?  I'm not sure.

Firstly, anytime you quote the OECD stats, you need to remember that there are two issues with these: firstly, they're often out of date (Mr Nichols doesn't tell us what figures he's discussing here, it needs to be noted) because the OECD can be comparing stats from 2009 for one country with stats from 2002 for another country.  This was something that concerned me greatly when I did stats work over the last three years.

Secondly, the OECD stats from one country will be based on the way that particular country collects them - which isn't necessarily the way another country collects them.   One of the issues we looked at constantly in my last job was suicide.  The suicide stats are always some years behind, because they rely on coroners confirming that a person has actually committed suicide.   That's in New Zealand, and is probably the same in similar countries.  In other countries suicides aren't necessarily recorded in the same way at all - in some countries suicides can bypass the stats easily. 

This isn't to say that the OECD stats are inflated on one hand and deflated on another.   It just means that we have to be careful that we're comparing apples with apples, and unfortunately we're usually not.

Mr Nichols writes about a report from the NZ Stats: The report's 2004 data – the latest available – reveals the richest 10 per cent collectively possess $128 billion in wealth, with median individual wealth of $255,000. In contrast, the poorest 10 per cent collectively possess $17.2b, with median individual wealth of $3200. While the richest 1 per cent held 16.4 per cent of the country's net wealth, the poorest 50 per cent owned just 5.2 per cent. 

Let's look at this a little.   Firstly, the report is seven years old.   We've had a recession since then, and considerable chaos in the world markets.    That's not to invalidate the report, it just needs to be borne in mine.

Secondly it would be interesting to know what the phrase 'median individual wealth' means, especially in relation to the poorest 10 per cent.   What wealth do these poor possess, exactly?   And since this is a median figure that presumably means some of them will possess/own nothing, while some will be comparitely well-off.   Meanwhile, what about the 80 percent (I'm not sure why 'per cent' is the form for Stuff, but I normally write percent as one word) in the middle?    What's their 'median individual wealth'?   We have no idea from this article, because it's making a case relating only to two groups, pitting extremes against each other.  Furthermore it doesn't seem to quite tally up with the 99 percent slogan put out by the Occupy movement.

I'm not going to pick this article apart word by word.   One final comment about another statement: But the gap between rich and poor still ranked ninth worst in the developed world in 2008. Again we're not given any stats/information to back this up, and I'm a bit confused as to what 'ninth worst' actually means.  In relation to what, or to whom? 

Reports that use stats in this way are similar to those 'scientific breakthrough' articles that we often see.  They throw around a bit of information, but not enough.  'Cure for cancer' is touted - until we read the fine print.  The trouble is the fine print seldom appears in the news reports, as it doesn't in these stats reports.

Linking, linking

A while ago I posted about the idea of linking to other blogs just for the fun of it, and so they could have an extra link on the system. I think officially it’s supposed to happen at the beginning of the month, but with my life slightly disordered at the moment, it’ll have to be today – whatever day it is.

Slouching towards Serfdom – this is strictly for those who understand shares and markets and such. It’s well done, but just a fraction incomprehensible to me!

Centrum Laban, el poder de las ideas looks like a site that’s into political things in a big way. Maybe even revolution.

The next blog appeared to be called Wasted Daze, and announced on its top post a site called getpoor.com. Apparently at that site “100% of the people who try this, WILL MAKE MONEY!!! It's mathematically impossible to fail...” Always one to be curious about people’s ideas about making money, I checked out getpoor.com. The section on how to get poor is a somewhat tongue-in-cheek page with diagrams on how wealth is made and who makes it. And who doesn’t. It’s wise enough to take a look. Not sure where you go afterwards, though, since the other pages on the site seem all to be ‘under construction.’ Furthermore, when you go back to the original Wasted Daze site, it’s all about making money on the Net – many of the possibilities seem pretty dubious.

Finally, Filmschatten – film that made (no) history. This site seems to consist of a lot of clips from movies, or the complete movies themselves in several chunks. Why The Seven Samurai should be included is anyone’s guess.

Gareth Farr: naked AND poor...?

A post on my other blog, webitz.net, about the relatively frequent appearance of ‘Gareth Farr’ and ‘naked’ in juxtaposition on Google searches, elicited an amusing response from the man himself, who now gets a chance to appear in my otherwise nondescript blog yet again.
I quote it in full:

Poor Old Gareth??!!
As a starving artist I may be poor, but at 39, I'm not that old, am I? Well, it's good of you to think of my feelings and show concern about my "beleagueredness" (is that even IN the dictionary?) but please don't worry - I haven't noticed any telescopes aimed at my house lately, and my nakedness hasn't been noticed by a soul (it only happens twice a day). And for your peace of mind - garethfarrnaked.com is not on my list of things to do anytime in the near future. All the bestGareth Farr (not naked)

I replied as follows, (though I’m not sure whether he’ll notice – hopefully he’s off composing more energetic music, music such as a man of his youth should be composing):

Sorry to hear you're starving, Gareth. I'll have to add that to the 'naked' factor and see if we can get a fund started for you!
Nah, 39 is a pretty good age, really, these days. Could be considered positively young, in fact.
'beleagueredness'? Yup, you may be right about its lack of dictionary placement, but I've used it more than once in my lifetime...
Thanks for dropping by.