Page 44 - Statistics for Dummies

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Part I: Vital Statistics about Statistics
by player. For each player, you get minutes played, field goals, free throws,
rebounds, assists, personal fouls, turnovers, blocks, steals, and total points.
Who needs to know this stuff, besides the players’ mothers? Apparently many
fans do. Statistics are something that sports fans can never get enough of
and players often can’t stand to hear about. Stats are the substance of water-
cooler debates and the fuel for armchair quarterbacks around the world.
Fantasy sports have also made a huge impact on the sports money-making
machine. Fantasy sports are games where participants act as owners to build
their own teams from existing players in a professional league. The fantasy
team owners then compete against each other. What is the competition based
on? Statistical performance of the players and teams involved, as measured
by rules set up by a “league commissioner” and an established point system.
According to the Fantasy Sports Trade Association, the number of people age
12 and up who are involved in fantasy sports is more than 30 million, and the
amount of money spent is $3–4 billion per year. (And even here you can ask
how the numbers were calculated — the questions never end, do they?)
Banking on business news
The business section of the newspaper provides statistics about the stock
market. In one week the market went down 455 points; is that decrease a lot
or a little? You need to calculate a percentage to really get a handle on that.
The business section of my paper contained reports on the highest yields
nationwide on every kind of certificate of deposit (CD) imaginable. (By the
way, how do they know those yields are the highest?) I also found reports
about rates on 30-year fixed loans, 15-year fixed loans, 1-year adjustable rate
loans, new car loans, used car loans, home equity loans, and loans from your
grandmother (well actually no, but if grandma read these statistics, she might
increase her cushy rates).
Finally, I saw numerous ads for those beloved credit cards — ads listing the
interest rates, the annual fees, and the number of days in the billing cycle. How
do you compare all the information about investments, loans, and credit cards
in order to make a good decision? What statistics are most important? The real
question is: Are the numbers reported in the paper giving the whole story, or
do you need to do more detective work to get at the truth? Chapters 16 and 17
help you start tearing apart these numbers and making decisions about them.
Touring the travel news

You can’t even escape the barrage of numbers by heading to the travel section.
For example, there I found that the most frequently asked question coming in to
the Transportation Security Administration’s response center (which receives

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