How wrong were the Brexit forecasts?
The economic doom that never was; childhood cancer figures and Ed Balls
Episodes
More or Less: Behind the Stats
Tim Harford and the More or Less team try to make sense of the statistics which surround us. From BBC Radio 4
Episodes
WS More or Less: How not to test public opinion
The survey by the Indian PM that broke all the polling rules and started a mass protest
Are you related to Edward III - and Danny Dyer?
What are the odds of being related to a medieval king? and how many cows for a fiver?
WS More or Less: Good news on renewables?
Renewable capacity has surpassed that of coal–is this good news? Plus an asteroid update.
Pensioners aren't poor anymore
High-rolling pensioners? predicting Norovirus, air pollution deaths and lost or found?
WS More or Less: Avoiding Asteroids
A new NASA warning system means we’re getting better at spotting Earth-bound space rocks. But how safe are we?
Is dementia the number one killer?
Is dementia on the rise? Plus immigration, incomplete contacts and chocolate muffins
WS More or Less: Liberia’s Rape Statistic Debunked
Sexual violence was widespread in Liberia’s brutal and bloody year civil war. But were three quarters of women in the country raped? We tell the story behind the number and reveal how well-meaning efforts to expose what happened have fuelled myths and miss-leading statistics that continue to be propagated to this day, including by the UN. We speak to Amelia Hoover Green from Drexel University, Dara Cohen from the Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University, researcher Phyllis Kimba and Ai...
US election, stray cats and puzzles
Who voted in the US elections? Plus are there nine million stray cats in the UK?
WS More or Less: Ice Cream versus aid
Does the world really spend three times as much on ice cream than on humanitarian aid?
Trump tells the Truth
The fact-checkers have been working overtime looking into the numbers used by Donald Trump during his campaign to become President of the USA. In the wake of the election next week, we take a look at some of Trump’s more outrageous statistical claims
WS More or Less: Child Marriage, Dangerous Algorithms
Is a girl under 15 married every seven seconds? And beware dangerous algorithms
WS More or Less: Escobar’s Cocaine Deaths
How many people die for every kilo of cocaine? More Or Less investigates.
WS More or Less: Algorithms, Crime and Punishment
When maths can get you locked up.
WS More or Less: The Sustainable Development Goals – are there just too many?
It’s now a year since the UN set its new Sustainable Development Goals to try to make the world a better place. They include 17 goals and a massive 169 targets on subjects like disease, education and governance. But some people like Bjorn Lomborg are saying that there’s just too many and they are too broad, and left like that will never achieve anything. Is he right – and is there a better way to make the world better and stop some countries lagging behind? Wesley Stephenson and Charlotte McDona...
WS More or Less: Who Won the US Presidential Debate?
Polling on the first TV debate between Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump appears to be divided over who won it. But not all polls are equal. If the people being polled aren’t representative of the population at large, then their responses may not tell you anything useful. And when internet polls can be hijacked by online activists, they can throw up some pretty strange results. (Photo: Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton first presidential debate. Credit: Getty Images)
WS More or Less: Trump’s crime claims
This week Donald Trump claimed that there are some inner city areas in the US which are suffering from the worst crime rates ever. They are so dangerous, he says, that Afghanistan is safer than many of these areas. But could this be true? We take a look at crime in the US and assess whether you can compare it to a conflict zone such as Afghanistan. (Image: Chicago - Neighbourhood residents watch as police investigate a homicide scene. Credit: Scott Olson/Getty Images)
WS More or Less: Wedding gift economics
Can economics help us work out the perfect amount to spend on a wedding gift? Our reporter Jordan Dunbar is in a tricky situation-he’s heading to an old friend’s wedding and needs to figure out how much to give as a gift without breaking the bank. Luckily, economist Maria Kozlovskaya is on hand to talk about her findings on what factors we need to consider for gift giving, as well as preserving Jordan’s friendship and wallet.
WS More or Less: Drug deaths in the Philippines
Over the last two months the Government in the Philippines has been encouraging the police to clampdown on the illegal drug trade. The new President, Rodrigo Duterte, went as far as saying that citizens could shoot and kill drug dealers who resisted arrest, and the killings of drug suspects were lawful if the police acted in self-defence. The press have been reporting numbers of how many people have been killed during the crackdown – but how much trust can we put in these figures? Lottery wins W...
WS More or Less: Menstrual Syncing
It is a commonly held belief that if women spend enough time together, their bodies start to communicate through chemical signals, known as pheromones. Eventually the women’s bodies will start to menstruate at the same time. But where does this idea come from? And is it really true? We look at the evidence and wonder – could it be down to chance?
Irish Passports
Britons entitled to Irish passports After the Brexit vote in June, so many Britons applied for Irish passports that Ireland’s foreign minister had to ask them to stop – pointing out that the UK remains, for now, in the EU. If some of the figures that have been quoted are correct, the Irish passport service may find itself completely inundated in future. But does one in four Britons really have Irish heritage? We reveal the dubious history of that number and attempt to estimate the number of Brit...
Death Penalty abolition
Statistics suggest that officially about half of the countries in the world have abolished Capital Punishment, and a further 52 have stopped its use in practice. But we tell the story behind the numbers and show why the picture is more complicated. We speak to Parvais Jabbar, co-director of the Death Penalty Project.
Gender Pay Gap
The “gender pay gap” This topic has been in the news this week after the Institute for Fiscal Studies published research showing women end up 33% worse off than their male counterparts after they have children. But earlier in the summer, Fraser Nelson wrote in the Telegraph that the pay gap is “no longer an issue” for women born after 1975. Can both assessments be true? And could the label “gender pay gap” be hindering our understanding of what really lies behind the numbers? The cost of a hospi...
WS More or Less: Counting Terror Deaths
With high profile attacks in Brussels, Nice and Munich, you might think that 2016 has been a particularly bad year for terrorism in Europe. But what happens when you put the numbers in historical context and compare them with figures for the rest of the world? More Or Less hears from Dr Erin Miller of the Global Terrorism Database and Harvard psychology professor Steven Pinker. (Image: A man wrapped in a Belgian flag holds a candle as people gather at a makeshift memorial on Place de la Bourse t...
Counting Terror Deaths
Is 2016 an unusually deadly year for terrorism? In a joint investigation with BBC Newsbeat and BBC Monitoring, we’ve analysed nearly 25,000 news articles to assess whether 2016 so far has been a unusually deadly year for terrorism. It certainly feels like it. But what do the numbers say? We estimate that, between January and July this year, 892 people died in terrorist attacks in Europe – making it the most deadly first seven months of a year since 1994. But the vast majority of those deaths hav...
WS More or Less: Swimming World Records
World Records are being set at a much faster rate in swimming than in other sports. At the Rio Olympics, British swimmer Adam Peaty managed to break the men's 100m breaststroke world record twice in two days. Tim Harford speaks to swimming coach, Rick Madge, about the reasons swimmers keep getting better results in the pool. Also, science writer Christie Aschwanden makes the case for the virtues of the 5,000 metre race. She says that in recent times it has become very popular for people to train...
Grammar Schools
It has been reported that Prime Minister Theresa May is planning on lifting the ban on creating new grammar schools. Chris Cook, Policy Editor for Newsnight, has been looking at the evidence for whether these selective schools improve exam performance or social mobility. Swimming World Records New world records are being set in swimming at a much faster rate than other sports – but why? Tim Harford speaks to swim coach and blogger, Rick Madge about the reason swimmers keep getting better results...
WS More or Less: Predicting Olympic Medals
How can we use statistics to predict how many medals each nation will win? We speak to Dr Julia Bredtmann, an economist at the RWI Leibniz Institute for Economic Research. She has come up with a model to predict how many medals each country will win, along with her colleagues, Sebastian Otten, also from the Leibniz Institute, and Carsten Crede of the University of East Anglia. Some countries like the US and China have a large population and GDP, but a number of countries do very well for their s...
Plastic Bags
The Government says that since the introduction of the 5p fee for single use plastic bags their use has plummeted. We take a look at the numbers. Olympic Medals at Rio 2016 The Olympic Games are with us again. So how can we use statistics to predict how many medals each nation will win? We speak to Dr Julia Bredtmann, an economist at the Leibniz Institute for Economic Research. Income inequality Politicians and commentators often claim that the rich are getting richer while the poor are getting ...
WS More or Less: Odd Socks and Algorithms
How can the techniques of computer science help us in everyday life? We speak to Brian Christian co-author of ‘Algorithms to Live by: The Computer Science of Human Decisions’. He argues that the techniques of computer science can help us manage everyday situations in a more logical and efficient manner. So which algorithm can help solve the problem of odd socks? And what is the most efficient way of alphabetising your book collection? Tim Harford investigates.