From My House to All of Yours...

 

I don't always put much stock in statistics. Here's why.

 

When I worked as a writer-editor for a safety magazine, I was expected to include at least a few statistics in most of my articles. After all, we were writing about mishaps most of the time.

 

Here's the problem I had with those statistics, though. Many times when I went to my expert statistician, she would give me a set of numbers that really didn't work for the article I wanted to write. So, I would go back and tell her such, at which point she always would ask, "What would you like the numbers to say?"

 

I'd answer her question, go back to my office, and, presto-chango, a short while later, she would produce a set of statistics reflecting exactly what I needed them to say. And that wasn't just a rare occurrence, either. It happened 50 percent or more of the time.

 

That's why I sometimes consider the power of numbers with a bit of reservation.

 

When I was thinking about a New Year's article for my blog, however, I decided to let numbers do some of the talking for me. As usual, I turned to the Internet for help. My focus was on drawing a correlation of some kind between people who make New Year's resolutions and those who play the lottery.

 

Ultimately, I settled on comparing the average percentage of people who actually keep their New Year's resolutions with the average chance of winning the lottery. I learned that only about 8 percent of those who make a New Year's resolution actually keep it. In comparison, lottery players have only a 0.026084 percent (less than three one-hundredths of a percent) chance of winning the big bucks. Using these numbers, I quickly was able to discern that you're 306 times (plus a little) more likely to keep your New Year's resolution than you are to win the lottery.

 

So, instead of following that advice to "play on America," as the lottery-drawing announcer on TV always tells you to do, I'd recommend that you sit down and come up with some good New Year's resolutions. Whether you resolve to shed a few pounds, make a killin' in the stock market, or maybe catch a world-record bass, your odds at doing those things far exceed any chances you have of picking the winning lotto numbers--based on my math. I'm no expert, though, so don't come back and ask me to make them say something else.

 

Have a safe, prosperous and Happy New Year--one and all.