Matters of Scale - Food for Thought
Approximate amount by which American women over age 20 increased their annual spending on soft drinks between 1985 and 1998 | 700000000 |
Amount American women over age 20 spent in 1998 for liposuction removal of fat | 607000000 |
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Number of additional people who could be fed, at U.S. levels of consumption, if the amount of food wasted in the United States each day were reduced by one-third | 26 million |
Number of people living in North Korea, which is slowly dying of famine | 25 million |
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Percentage of meals eaten inside U.S. homes in 1998 that were home-cooked | 16 |
Percentage that were from fast-food or take-out | 62 |
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Work time it takes to earn enough to buy a McDonald's Big Mac hamburger in the United States | 11 minutes |
Work time it takes to buy a Big Mac in Nairobi, Kenya | 480 minutes |
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Percentage of the U.S. labor force employed in farming, fishing, and forestry in 1998 | 2.8 |
Percentage of U.S. residents in jail or on probation or parole in the same year | 2.8 |
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Sources: Soft drink sales: Jane Brody, New York Times; liposuction expenditures: Worldwatch estimate based on data from American Academy of Cosmetic Surgery; food wasted: Economic Research Service, USDA; home cooked vs. take-out: Cook's Illustrated work time and Big Macs: Yes magazine, cited in HopeDance magazine; U.S. labor force in farming, etc: CIA, U.S. residents in jail, etc.: U.S. Department of Justice