Facts & Trends

The average American woman now weighs 166.2 pounds, about the same as the average American man weighed in the early 1960's.  Over the same time period, U.S. men have gained nearly 30 pounds, from 166.3 in the '60's to 195.5 ...

2,500 - Number of U.S. military dogs on duty worldwide $2,000,000 - Amount the U.S. spent on developing a robotic mule ...

When communities like San Francisco and Seattle began banning plastic bags, said Ramesh Ponnuru, it seemed like a public-spirited thing to do. But' benign-seeming laws often have unintended consequences— and the plastic-bag ban is now producing a sickening result. The ...

Reported incidents of unruly passenger behavior on airplanes soared from 339 in 2007 to 8,217 in 2013 ...

As the population ages and lives longer, dementia has become one of the country's most expensive medical conditions, with $109 billion in direct medical costs in 2010, a new RAND study found. The medical cost of dementia exceeds that of ...

88: Number of executions carried out in Saudi Arabia so far this year, already surpassing the total number in 2014; Amnesty International called the increase under Saudi’s new King Salman a “macabre spike” ...

The Pew Research Center asked adult Internet users in 32 developing and emerging countries if they use social networks. Here’s a sampling of who said yes: Philippines 93% Venezuela 88% Indonesia 86% Egypt 78% China 58% ...

Minimum number of murders committed in India since 2000 whose motive was witch hunting: 2,257 ...

2,000,000+ - Number of hours U.S. drones have spent in flight ...

A growing numbers of drought-afflicted California farmers began hiring dowsers to locate underground water.  “Scientists don’t believe in it,” said vintner Marc Mondavi, “but I do and most of the farmers in the [Napa] Valley do.” ...