Sunday, Mar. 13, 2005

Numbers

8 hr. 33 min. Average amount of media content U.S. children age 8 to 18 are exposed to each day, up from 7 hr. 29 min. in 2000

1 hr. 2 min. Average amount of time kids spend each day on computers (not counting homework), up from 27 min. in 2000

47 Number of people on a government terrorism watch list who were approved by the FBI to buy guns last year

24 hr. Length of time within which the FBI is required by law to destroy the record of a gun-ownership application after it has been approved

2400 Perfect score on the new SAT for college admissions, now that the test includes an essay portion

1600 Former perfect SAT score

80% Proportion of winning Powerball tickets since 1992 featuring numbers that were computer generated; in the rest, the numbers were chosen by the player

13% Proportion of winning tickets that included "unlucky" number 13; 11% included "lucky" number 7

Sources: Kaiser Family Foundation (2); Government Accountability Office (2); USA Today (2); Powerball (2)