Percentage of American spouses who say they argue about money in their marriage, according to a survey by Money magazine: 70
Percentage of husbands who say they think their wives care about having the right investments: 27
Percentage of wives who say they care about having the right investments: 48
Source: Mathew Greenwald & Associates. Contact Brian Perlman at 202-686-0300 or BrianPerlman@greenwaldresearch.com.
Percentage of e-mails received worldwide in 2005 that were spam, according to a study done by MessageLabs: 68.6
Chance that an e-mail received contained a virus or a trojan: 1 in 36.15
Chance that an e-mail was part of a phishing campaign: 1 in 304
Source: MessageLabs. Contact Shelley Driscoll at 646-519-8102 or sdriscoll@messagelabs.com.
Number of patents issued by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office in the calendar year 2005: 157,750
Percentage of those granted to U.S.-resident inventors: 52.4
Percentage of all patents that were granted to U.S. independent inventors: 15.5
Rank of California, Texas, New York and Michigan as the states with the largest percentage share of U.S.-resident inventor patents issued: 1, 2, 3, 4
Source: U.S. Patent and Trademark Office. Contact Brigid Quinn at 571-272-8335 or brigid.quinn@uspto.gov.
Percentage of remote and mobile workers worldwide who say they rely on their memories to keep track of their network passwords, according to a survey for SonicWALL Inc.: 56
Percentage of respondents of both sexes who said they wear sweats while working from home: 39
Percentage of women surveyed who said they showered on work-at-home days: 44
Percentage of men who said they showered on work-at-home days: 30
Source: SonicWALL. Contact Mary McEvoy at 408-745-9600 or mmcevoy@sonicwall.com.
Percentage of medical students who borrow money to pay for school, according to data from the Association of American Medical Colleges: 85
Of students who have debt, average debt medical students graduated with in 2005 (includes pre-med borrowing): $120,280
Percentage of medical students who graduate with loans of more than $100,000: 67
Source: Association of American Medical Colleges. Contact Nicole Buckley at 202-828-0041 or nbuckley@aamc.org.
Number of liters of water it takes to produce one kilogram of wheat, according to the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations: 1,200
Number of liters of water it takes to produce one kilo of pork: 6,000
Number of liters of water it takes to produce one kilo of beef: 15,000
Number of liters of water it takes to produce a person's daily food: 2,000 to 5,000
Source: Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations. Contact Christopher Matthews at (+39) 06 570 53762 or christopher.matthews@fao.org.
Rank of Google, Apple, Skype, Starbucks and IKEA as the five brand names that had the most impact on people in 2005, according to a global survey by Brandchannel.com: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5
Source: Brandchannel.com. Contact Robin Rusch at 212-798-7663 or rrusch@brandchannel.com.
Percentage of Americans who planned to celebrate Easter, according to a survey by the National Retail Federation: 78
Projected Easter spending for 2006: $12.63 billion
Amount the average shopper was expected to spend on Easter this year: $121.72
Source: National Retail Federation. Contact Scott Krugman at 202-783-7971 or krugmans@nrf.com.
John MacIntyre has been writing Figuratively Speaking since 1989. You can contact him by e-mail at johnmacintyre@bwr.eastlink.ca.