You’re reading Significant Digits, a daily digest of the numbers tucked inside the news.
6.2 injuries
Tesla recorded 722 injuries last year — about two per day — and the rate of serious injuries was 30 percent worse than the industry average. Tesla’s touted injury rate in 2017 of 6.2 injuries per 100 workers has been cast in doubt following an investigation that found the company failed to report several serious injuries on mandatory reports. [Reveal News]
26 firefighters
Twenty-six New York City firefighters who were caught with a failed drug test since 2016 were reinstated in the past month, signaling an end to a zero tolerance policy. I’m telling you, “I smoked weed to familiarize myself with the true enemy: fire,” is a valid excuse at work now. [The New York Post]
62 percent
That’s the percentage of people who, according to a survey by management consulting firm A.T. Kearney, said they trusted banks’ ability to safeguard personal information. I’m a Wells Fargo customer who falls on the Dale Gribble end of the “trust in institutions” scale, and that 62 percent strikes me as about right. The shocker is that’s still way, way higher than respondents’ trust in Facebook’s ability to keep their data safe. Only 20 percent of respondents (pre-Cambridge Analytica!) thought Facebook was trustworthy in that regard. [CFO]
400 ppm
Concentrations of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere has risen to upwards of 400 parts per million, which has brought about a doubling of the pollen production of ragweed, according to USDA research. In other words, yes your allergies are getting worse, and yes it’s in many ways due to climate change. [Vox]
$61 million
That is the eye-popping amount of money Dish Network has to pay as part of a class action lawsuit related to unwanted telemarketing calls. But some of the people who won the money don’t know it yet. The 18,000 people who are eligible to receive somewhere between $2,400 and $30,000 as part of the verdict are hanging up the phone when informed that they can get free money because of a couple of unwanted telephone calls they barely remember. [ABA Journal]
$24 billion
Amount of money spent on stadiums — professional, amateur and college — by state and local governments since 1990, a staggering figure that can be difficult to justify when the on-field product doesn’t necessarily bring in the demand that could economically justify such spending. [The Atlantic]
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