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2003-06-21 - 4:50 p.m. I'm reading: Wired I'm listening to: Iggy Pop Link O' The Day: butt bra HARPER'S INDEX May 2003 Last calendar year in which the Dow Jones Industrial Average gained in value : 1999 Last period in which the Dow declined for four consecutive years : 1929, 1932 Source: Dow Jones (N.Y.C.) Percentage change since 1968 in the real value of the U.S. federal minimum wage : 37 Source: U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics Percentage of Americans who believed in early March that Saddam Hussein was involved in the September 11 attacks : 45 Source: CBS News (N.Y.C.) Weeks before this poll was taken that President Bush said that he "can't make [the] claim" of such a link : 5 Source: White House transcript, 1/31/03 Ratio of the price of a barrel of oil in March to the price of a body bag from the U.S. military's supplier : 1:1 Source: Harper's research/Defense Supply Center (Philadelphia) Estimated percentage by which the average U.S. gasoline price would rise if costs of securing oil were recouped with a tax : 29 Source: Prof. Darwin C. Hall, California State University, Long Beach Number of new Indonesian islands discovered by satellite analysis in February : 1,000 Source: Embassy of the Republic of Indonesia (Washington) Price for a fifteen-child sleepover in the Bronx Zoo's Congo Gorilla Forest exhibit : $4,500 Source: Wildlife Conservation Society (Bronx, N.Y.) Per capita GDP of the Republic of Congo : $900 Source: U.S. Central Intelligence Agency Average number of days an oiled seabird survives in the wild after cleaning and release : 6 Source: Brian E. Sharp, Ecological Perspectives (Portland, Oreg.) Average number of industrial compounds and pollutants that can be found in an American's blood and urine : 91 Source: Environmental Working Group (Washington) Pounds of steel discovered to have been eaten away from the head of an Ohio nuclear reactor in February 2002 : 70 Thickness in inches of the warped stainless steel that remained to prevent the reactor from rupturing into the air : 3?8 Source: Ohio Citizen Action (Cleveland) Percentage, respectively, of the U.S. fathers and mothers responsible for child support who do not pay it : 26, 36 Source: U.S. Census Bureau Percentage of employed U.S. mothers who think full-time mothers look down on them : 66 Percentage of full-time mothers who think employed mothers look down on them : 73 Source: Family Circle (N.Y.C.) Figures cited have been adjusted for inflation and are the latest available as of March 2003. "Harper's Index" is a registered trademark. � 
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