Archive for February, 2019
Recreational reading off by more than 25%
Posted by mark in pop, Uncategorized on February 24, 2019
I’ve noticed that none of my many offspring or their significant others read newspapers (that I know of), while I and many others of my generation keep up with at least one daily publication. This report by BookRiot bears me out—passing along Bureau of Labor Statistics that Americans 15 years and older spent an average of only 16.8 minutes a day reading non-work (or non-school) materials in 2017—down from 22.8 minutes in 2005. According to BookRiot, we fall far behind India, the world leader, India, who came in at nearly over 90 minutes of reading per day. Given their literacy rate of 60% versus the USA’s 99% level,* that is quite impressive.
The New Yorker points out that the average American reader is reading more. However, this is counteracted by fewer people reading anything at all, falling from 26.3 per cent of the population in 2003 to 19.5 per cent in 2016.** That worries me–over 80% of Americans who, evidently, only watch TV. Read these reports and weep.
“People in the U.S. spend 10 times more time watching TV than reading.”
– Sarah Nicolas, BookRiot
**“Why We Don’t Read, Revisited”, Caleb Crain, June 14, 2018
A blog about blob
“Americans are getting fatter…and shorter” said the headline in the Venice Florida Gondolier Sun last month. The fatter bit was easy to swallow (ha ha), but the second part of this news–the lessening heights–caught me short (yeah, another bad pun).
Here are the average body measures for 2016 gleaned by the Gondolier Sun (Bob Mudge) from this just-released survey by the Department of Health & Human Services (HHS):
- Men 5 feet 9 inches, 197.8 pounds, 40.3 inch waist
- Women 5 feet 3.6 inches, 170.5 pounds, 38.7 inch waist
Mudge reported that the average man is four-tenths of an inch shorter than in 2006. At this rate I figure that men will be reduced to the size of a mouse by the year 3716.
Meanwhile, the New York Times (Nicholas Bakalar) noted that men have gained 8 pounds since 2002. Doing my math on weights projected to 3716 I calculate a massive 1170 pounds for these future mouse-sized men. That is dense (as are my projections)!
My frivolous extrapolations notwithstanding, the realities of actual measurements by HHS are harsh. Is it too late for New Year’s resolutions? If not, I am working on increasing my height in 2019.
“People tend to overreport their height and underreport their weight.”
– Cynthia L Ogden, epidemiologist and senior author of HHS’s National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey