{"id":2825,"date":"2011-03-29T09:06:43","date_gmt":"2011-03-29T09:06:43","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.rightwinggranny.com\/?p=2825"},"modified":"2011-03-29T09:06:43","modified_gmt":"2011-03-29T09:06:43","slug":"how_to_manipulate_numbers_to_d","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rightwinggranny.com\/?p=2825","title":{"rendered":"How To Manipulate Numbers To Draw Really Dumb Conclusions"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>The <a href=\"http:\/\/www.americanthinker.com\/blog\/2011\/03\/want_to_live_forever_raise_the.html\">American Thinker<\/a>&nbsp;posted an article today linking to an <a href=\"http:\/\/www.ajc.com\/business\/who-wins-with-higher-880780.html\">Atlanta Journal Constitution<\/a>&nbsp;article entitled, &#8220;Who Wins With Higher Gas Prices?&#8221;&nbsp; Dan Chapman, who wrote the article, cites statistical proof that high gas prices result in better public health.<\/p>\n<p>The American Thinker cites part of the article:<\/p>\n<blockquote><p><font size=\"3\" face=\"times new roman,times\"><em>&#8220;Other health benefits accrue to higher <\/em><a href=\"http:\/\/g.ajc.com\/r\/C7\/\" target=\"_blank\"><font color=\"#0033cc\"><em>gas prices<\/em><\/font><\/a><em>. Charles Courtemanche, an economics professor at the University of North Carolina at Greensboro, recently published a study showing that <strong>a sustained $1 increase in the price of a gallon of gas results in a 10 percent drop in the nation&#8217;s obesity rate.<\/strong><\/em><\/font><\/p>\n<p><em><font size=\"3\" face=\"times new roman,times\">&#8220;Americans who walk and bike more often and eat at restaurants less often will suffer fewer obesity-related diseases. <strong>Every $1 uptick in <a href=\"http:\/\/g.ajc.com\/r\/C7\/\" target=\"_blank\"><font color=\"#0033cc\">gas prices<\/font><\/a> saves 11,000 lives and $11 billion in health-care costs annually. <\/strong>[Emphasis mine]&#8221;<\/font><br \/><\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><font size=\"3\" face=\"times new roman,times\"><\/p>\n<p><\/font>American Thinker points out what happens when you follow this&nbsp;logic to its obvious conclusion:<\/p>\n<blockquote style=\"MARGIN-RIGHT: 0px\" dir=\"ltr\">\n<p style=\"MARGIN-RIGHT: 0px\" dir=\"ltr\"><em><font size=\"3\" face=\"Times New Roman\">&#8220;In other words, if gas prices increase by $40 per gallon, we can virtually eliminate obesity in America (do the math). But even better, if we raise the price per gallon by $27,275.00, we can save the lives of every American, presumably in perpetuity, and erase the national debt.&#8221;<\/font><br \/><\/em><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<p style=\"MARGIN-RIGHT: 0px\" dir=\"ltr\">We&#8217;d better be careful and not give the environmentalists any wild ideas!&nbsp;&nbsp;There are a few things Dan Chapman leaves out&#8211;what increased gasoline prices do to the price of food, making it more difficult for lower income families to buy&nbsp;healthy food, people who work 30 or 40 miles from home in an area that does not have public transportation, and the crippling effect increased&nbsp;fuel&nbsp;costs have on the economy.&nbsp; This is truly a really dumb statistical conclusion.&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The American Thinker&nbsp;posted an article today linking to an Atlanta Journal Constitution&nbsp;article entitled, &#8220;Who Wins With Higher Gas Prices?&#8221;&nbsp; Dan Chapman, who wrote the article, cites statistical proof that high gas prices result in better public health. The American Thinker &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/www.rightwinggranny.com\/?p=2825\">Continue reading <span class=\"meta-nav\">&rarr;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2825","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rightwinggranny.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2825","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rightwinggranny.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rightwinggranny.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rightwinggranny.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rightwinggranny.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2825"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rightwinggranny.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2825\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rightwinggranny.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2825"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rightwinggranny.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2825"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rightwinggranny.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2825"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}