MILITARY DEMOGRAPHICS
16.0% Percentage of total military forces who are female 71.9% Percentage of military forces who are Caucasian 2.2% Percentage of military forces who identify as lesbian, gay or bisexual
Read moreCategory: Facts & Trends
How We Police
Number of U.S. States that allow the death penalty: 31 Proportion of U.S. police departments that are using body cameras: 1 in 3
Read moreNuke Facts
15,654 – Total known land area, in square miles (40,544 sq km), of U.S. nuclear-weapon bases and facilities 2 – Minimum number of people required to authorize a U.S. nuclear attack
Read moreDrinking in Modern America
Americans drink far less today than our predecessors did. In 1830, the average American drank the equivalent of 7.1 gallons of pure alcohol per year. In 2013, by comparison, the average American drank the equivalent of 2.34 gallons of pure alcohol.
Read moreWater, Water Everywhere
Estimated minimum gallons of water used annually to produce Coca Cola products: 8,000,000,000,000 Portion of the world’s population that amount would supply with drinking water each year: 1/4
Read moreGreat Art
Ripley’s Believe It or Not! museum is already home to an artist’s rendition of da Vinci’s “The Last Supper” made from burned toast, and now comes a recent version by Laura Bell of Roscommon, MI — da Vinci’s masterpiece made with clothes-dryer lint. Bell said she did about 800 hours of laundry of various-colored towels to obtain lint of the […]
Read moreAverage American Income
The average American’s income declined almost 1 percent in 2014, to $64,432.The income of the poorest fifth of the population fell by 3.5 percent, to $9,818, while the income of the wealthiest fifth rose by nearly 1 percent, to $166,048.
Read moreThe Most Popular Names
The five most popular names for baby girls in 2014 were (in order) Emma, Olivia, Sophia, Isabella, and Ava, according to the U.S. Social Security Administration. For boys, the most popular were Noah, Liam, Mason, Jacob, and William.
Read moreMilitary Bases
The Department of Defense has 562,000 military bases and facilities located around the world, which collectively cover 24.7 million acres—nearly the size of Virginia. Much of that space is now unused, but Congress has barred the Pentagon from conducting a detailed assessment out of fear that bases in home districts would be closed.
Read moreOld gods, new temple
Neopagans in Iceland are erecting a temple dedicated to the Norse gods Thor, Odin, and Frigg for the first time in over 1,000 years. The temple will be built by the Asatru movement, which was founded in the 1970s to revive the ancient religion and now has more than 2,000 followers ina coutnry with just 320,000 people. Hilmar Orn Flilmarsson, Asatru’s […]
Read more