Wild Statistics That Change The Way We See The World
How likely are you to die in a shark attack? How much of the world’s oceans are still unexplored? How many millions of times a year do we blink? If, like us, you need to know the answers to these questions, read on. We’ve searched far and wide and gathered the most mind-blowing facts and stats we could find. We can’t believe we hated statistics in school because these numerical nuggets of wisdom are seriously cool.
1. You're more likely to become a movie star than win the Powerball Jackpot
There’s just something so tantalizing about playing the lottery. With a huge stroke of luck, your life could change forever. Yet to win a jackpot totaling in the hundreds of millions, the odds aren’t really in your favor.
When the Powerball prize sat at $700 million in August 2017, experts noted people had a one in 292.2 million chance of taking it home. Now, if you compare that to the stats listed in The Book of Odds, you’ll see that you’d have a much better shot at becoming a Hollywood megastar instead. That’s about 500 times more likely!
2. You're twice as likely to be killed by a vending machine than a shark
We don’t blame you if you’re afraid of sharks. The Jaws movie saga has traumatized a lot of people over the years! But is that fear justified? Are shark attacks as deadly as they appear? Well, this stat might surprise you.
According to the Slate website, only one person in America lost their life to the finned predator in 2021. Remarkably, you’re twice as likely to be killed by a falling vending machine: at least two individuals per year have suffered that fate in the last 40 years or so.
3. Thousands of left-handed people lose their lives using right-handed items
Attention all left-handed readers: You’ll definitely want to take note of this next statistic, it’s a real eye-opener. Whenever you’re offered the chance to use a product specifically designed for your needs, don’t ignore it. That decision could actually kill you!
Yes, as per British newspaper The Guardian, close to 2,500 lefties lose their lives each year by utilizing items designed for right-handed folks. Apparently, power saws top this hazardous list. Oh, to be ambidextrous!
4. Airplane travel is safer than riding in a car
While it might seem pretty rational to be afraid of air travel, we’ve got some news for you. The stats strongly suggest that it’s the safest form of transport you could ever wish to use. As per a study from Harvard University, the chances of being involved in a plane crash are one in 1.2 million.
And the odds are even more distant that it would kill you: they’re one in 11 million. By comparison, you’ve got a one in 5,000 shot of losing your life in an automobile wreck.
5. There’s a one in four chance that the person next to you can’t read this
It’s easy to assume that everyone has some form of reading comprehension, especially today with smartphones and tablets in constant use. But that’s not the case: incredibly, statistics gathered by the U.S. Department of Education in 2019 revealed that 43 million American adults couldn’t read.
Put another way, that’s about one in seven adults, and one in five Americans overall. That’s hard to wrap your head around, right? To try to help reduce these eye-opening numbers, the American Library Association and other organizations do lay on literacy lessons free of charge.
6. If you cracked an egg a day for three years, chances are you'd only see one double yolk
Have you ever come across a double-yolked egg? Trust us, they do exist! Finding one isn’t particularly easy, though: your chances are roughly one in 1,000.
This means that should you break open a single shell each day over a period of three years, you’d probably only see one double yolk. Yet a teenager living in London, England, somehow picked up a full box of them — yes, a dozen — back in the summer of 2016.
7. Only three countries in the whole world use the Imperial measuring system
In America, the Imperial system of weights and measures is king. We hear your cry, “How could anyone use different units of measurement?” Well, outside the States, mention of inches, Fahrenheit, feet, and ounces raises more than a few eyebrows.
Practically every nation around the globe utilizes the metric system instead. Only a pair of other countries, Myanmar and Liberia, are in the same boat as the U.S. Meanwhile, Great Britain stands alone in calling upon a mix of the two systems. Talk about sitting on the fence!
8. 0.3 percent of solar energy from the Sahara is enough to power the whole of Europe
Both clean and bountiful, solar energy could solve a lot of problems across the world. But harnessing it isn’t as straightforward as it might sound: not all countries get an abundance of Sun over the course of a year. So, that’s what makes this particular stat so intriguing.
As per Arnulf Jaeger-Waldau, who works for the European Commission’s Institute for Energy, a mere 0.3 percent of the Sahara’s solar energy could power Europe. All of it. Now, is that not absolutely staggering?
9. Each American generates about 4.48 pounds of trash every single day
Are you curious about how much trash you throw out every year? Well, these statistics might just shock you. Back in 2015, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency unveiled some startling numbers. At that time, research noted that each U.S. citizen created roughly 4.48 pounds of rubbish each day.
In terms of weight, that’s a little heavier than a single brick. And annually, the figure was hitting over 1,600 pounds. That’s the equivalent of an adult Aberdeen Angus cow!
10. People are more likely to have a heart attack on a Monday
After enjoying a relaxing weekend at home with your loved ones, Mondays can be a real drag. Can anyone truly say it’s their favorite day of the week? Still, that doesn’t make this next stat any less shocking.
Following a study that covered the period 2008 until 2012 at 11 medical facilities, it was found that Mondays carried a disproportionately high heart attack risk. For guys, the figure stood at around 20 percent more, while the number for ladies was roughly 15 percent.
11. At any moment in time, there are around 61,000 people in the airspace above the United States
While roads can become inundated with traffic, the same might be said about America’s skies as well. Yes, even back in 2017 Duncan Aviation, an “aircraft acquisition” business, reported that roughly 61,000 travelers were flying over the U.S. no matter when.
To give you a better feel for those numbers, that’s just 3,000 or so shy of Cheyenne, Wyoming’s, whole populace. So it can get very busy up there! Apparently, Hartsfield–Jackson Atlanta International Airport in Georgia was the single most popular starting point, stop, or destination for those passengers.
12. There are more synapses in your brain than there are stars in our galaxy
If, like most of us, you're just an amateur stargazer, then the following entry is likely to leave you stunned. According to experts, the Milky Way Galaxy is home to over 200 billion stars. And yet even that huge figure is dwarfed when it comes to talking about the nervous system in the human brain.
Known as synapses, neuroscientists have claimed that the standard toddler boasts nearly a quadrillion of these connections. And as we get older, it drops down to around a mere 500 trillion.
13. Nearly 75 percent of states in the U.S. have more prisons or jails than colleges
For those hoping to refine their skills in a particular subject after leaving high school, college is the next logical step. But America isn’t overflowing with universities. In fact, the education website Studee found that in 2022 close to 75 percent of the country’s states had fewer colleges than prisons.
As an example, Wyoming is home to 28 jails and only four higher education facilities. The ratio is equally skewed in places such as Alaska, Mississippi, Louisiana, and Alabama, too.
14. 34 percent of adults still sleep with a comforter or plushie
Do you still take your beloved childhood bear to bed with you today as an adult? Well, there’s no need to be embarrassed about it: research suggests you’re far from alone! Yep, Sleepopolis and OnePoll spoke to 2,000 people regarding this topic and came away with some fascinating results.
As per the report, 34 percent of those individuals admitted to grabbing old blankets, toys, and “other sentimental objects” before hitting the hay. Yes, that’s about one in three of us!
15. The average person makes enough saliva in a month to fill 23 two-liter bottles
How’s this for a mouth-watering statistic? Back in 2009, the Journal of Medicine and Life publication shared a report about the average human’s saliva output. The research paper revealed that the number sat between 0.5 and 1.5 liters each day, with the monthly figure coming to around 46.5 liters.
That’s a crazy amount of drool! To help you picture it, that much saliva could be poured into a set of 23 bottles measuring 2 liters in size.
16. Roughly 90 percent of the world's population lives in the Northern Hemisphere
In 2018 the global population was measured at about 7.3 billion people. And of that number, some 6.57 billion could be found in the northern hemisphere. That’s roughly 90 percent of the total figure!
But the discrepancy does make sense when you take a closer look. Quite simply, it’s all about geography. Close to 70 percent of our planet’s land is located north of the equator, while in the southern region, more than 80 percent is dominated by water.
17. Car airbags kill one person for every 22 lives that they save
On the whole, car airbags do their job when they’re called into action: they save a lot of lives. Having said that, though, not everyone comes out unscathed. According to the Statistic Brain Research Institute, for every 22 passengers they protect, one person loses their life when an airbag goes off.
And there’s good odds it could be a woman. It was reported in 2019 that female motorists had a 17 percent higher chance of dying in collisions compared to guys.
18. One human hair can support 3 ounces
How strong do you think your hair is? Surely it can’t support a whole lot of weight, right? Well, this stat could catch you off-guard. As per the Statistic Brain Research Institute website, a single human follicle is sturdy enough to hold 3 ounces without breaking.
That’s the equivalent of a normal deck of 52 playing cards, or a stack of 15 quarters. Given that stat, it wouldn’t surprise us if, beneath a microscope, our locks were rocking six-packs and biceps worthy of any gym!
19. Innocent people will admit to a crime around 43 percent of the time
This might sound like a crazy question, but bear with us! Would you ever take responsibility for a crime you didn’t commit? We can probably guess your answer. Statistically, though, it isn’t that straightforward.
Incredibly, when the pressure’s on, about 43 percent of people have been known to admit their guilt in something of which they’ve been falsely accused. Why? Well, according to research from Iowa State University, innocent folks aren’t as robust as the guilty in their own defense due to lower stress levels. And if questioning lasts for hours on end, that can lead them to crack.
20. If you picked a random Swede and a random Canadian, the Swede would be most likely to speak English
Here’s another seemingly obvious question. Which nation would you suspect has a better grasp of the English language: Canada or Sweden? If you went with the former, this might come as a surprise.
While Swedish is the go-to language across the Scandinavian country, 86 percent of the population knows English as well. As for Canada, the Pew Research Center reports that only 57 percent speak English there. Lest we forget, French also has “federal status” in the Great White North.
21. One million seconds lasts 11 days. One billion seconds lasts 31 years.
If you ever wanted to get a sense of the vast difference between a million and a billion, this wild statistic has you covered. One million seconds last for just over 11 days: the equivalent of a short vacation.
With breaks, it took a man named Jeremy Harper some 89 days to count up to the six-figure total, which earned him a Guinness World Record. Yet one billion seconds spans in excess of 31 years. Yes, you’re reading that correctly!
22. People who are currently alive represent just 7 percent of everyone who’s ever lived
According to the Population Reference Bureau website, around 117 billion people have lived on our planet from 190,000 B.C.E. onwards. It’s a mind-boggling number, and this stat is even crazier. As per the organization, the human population in 2022 was at 7.9 billion.
That meant everyone who was alive then represented 7 percent of the previously mentioned figure. “Because we’ve existed on Earth for approximately 200,000 years, that’s actually a fairly large percentage,” the site noted.
23. 95 percent of the world’s oceans have yet to be explored
Even though they cover more than 70 percent of the planet, there’s still so much we don’t know about our oceans. They’re extremely mysterious places, and it’s not hard to understand why when looking at this statistic.
The website Interesting Engineering reported that a whopping 95 percent of the sea remains unexplored. To really hammer that home, Dr. Gene Feldman, a NASA oceanographer, noted, “We have better maps of the surface of Mars and the Moon than we do of the bottom of the ocean.” Wow!
24. Vatican City has 5.9 Popes per square mile
Considering that it sits right in the middle of Rome, Italy, it’s easy to forget that Vatican City is actually a country in its own right: you won’t find a smaller sovereign state anywhere else around the globe.
With a populace of just over 500 today, the tiny nation only spans some 0.17 square miles. Hey, we said it was small! And here’s a random stat to wrap your head around: that equates to 5.9 Popes per square mile!
25. Fewer than two percent of NCAA student-athletes go professional
When looking at the up-and-comers who are part of America’s National Collegiate Athletics Association, you’d expect a large portion of them to become professional athletes. That’s not the case, though.
Reaching the required level of the NCAA from high school is hard enough, with only 6 percent making the cut. But when it comes to going pro, the organization has noted that fewer than 2 percent of its students have hit the jackpot. So, it isn’t a surefire path to future millions!
26. A new parent loses around 350 hours of sleep across their baby’s first year
As any mom or dad will tell you, by and large, the joy of becoming a parent can’t be overstated. Yet at the same time, it does bring with it challenges, the hardest of which may be the lack of sleep. Yes, as newborn babies rest sporadically over spells of 16 and 20 hours each day, there’s no chance to get a solid night’s snooze.
In fact, the HealthDay website reports that parents will miss out on roughly 350 hours of sleep up until their kid’s first birthday.
27. Dragonflies are Earth’s most efficient predator
From lions to tigers, our planet is home to some extremely scary predators. But how’s this for a shock: the most efficient killer of them all is actually an insect. While conducting research for a project in 2012, Harvard University discovered that dragonflies successfully hunted down their quarries 95 percent of the time.
Apparently, the eye-catching bug boasts quite the brain, mapping out estimates of where its target is likely to flee to. No wonder they’re so hard to escape!
28. There are more ways to arrange a deck of cards than there are atoms on Earth
We hope you’re sitting down for this next entry: it’s quite the mind-bender! With 52 cards in a standard deck, the variation of hands to come from shuffles is practically endless. We’re not exaggerating here: the McGill University website reports that the number has a jaw-dropping 67 zeros in it.
Broadly speaking, Earth’s atom count can’t even touch that figure, which is absolutely staggering to think about. So don’t bother trying to shuffle the exact same hand twice: it could take a while!
29. You’re more likely to die on your birthday than on any other day
Is your birthday on the way? Well, this stat could potentially leave you on tenterhooks. An economics analyst from the University of Chicago named Pablo Pena uncovered a startling finding in 2015.
While writing a paper for the Social Science & Medicine publication, he found that the average birthday death rate was 6.7 percent greater than anticipated. Plus, Pena also noticed that the numbers went up if the big day came on a weekend, too. Sorry if we’ve put a damper on your upcoming party!
30. The probability of being born is about one in 400 trillion
A lot has to go right for a person to be born. Firstly, your future parents needed to meet and then (maybe) fall in love, which wasn’t a given. After that, the chances of the right sperm inseminating the egg are said to be in the region of one in 400 quadrillion, as per The Huffington Post. Nope, that’s not a typo!
On top of that, you’ve got to consider your forebears as well. They went through this process for centuries, with each birth bringing you closer to being. Quite frankly, it’s amazing to consider we all made it here!
31. The human eye blinks an average of 12,000 times every day
From rehydrating our corneas to clearing away any flecks of dust or dirt, blinking is integral to our bodies’ operation. We couldn’t function properly without it. But that’s got us thinking. How often do we actually blink during our lives?
Well, as per Lens.me, optical experts believe that the average daily number is 12,000 blinks. And rounded up across an entire year, that figure comes to 4.2 million times. Our eyelids are certainly getting a pretty strenuous workout, then!
32. The world needs to produce at least 60 percent more food by 2050 to feed everyone
The Food and Agriculture Organization has predicted that Earth’s population could hit around 9.3 billion by 2050. And should that happen, a lot needs to be done to ensure that our food sources can keep everyone fed.
Overall, the FAO has calculated that food manufacturing has to increase by 60 percent when we reach that point. It might seem like a long way away, but putting plans in place ahead of time will be vital.
33. 80 percent of the time people ever spend with their kids is over by the time they turn 18
Attention all parents: the following statistic is sure to hit you right in the heart. When children are young, they spend countless hours in the company of their moms and dads. But naturally, as they grow older, that time gets slashed with each passing year.
All of the above information brings us to this: a question posed on The Fit Dad Lifestyle website read, “Did you know that 80 percent of the time we ever spend with our kids is over by the time they turn 18?” Like we said, it’s a choker!
34. 31.5 million U.S. adults claim to have Irish ancestry
While St. Patrick’s Day is obviously a significant occasion in Ireland, it gets a lot of attention in America as well. You see, many citizens in the U.S. have familial ties to the Emerald Isles, and they want to celebrate that.
But what kind of numbers are we talking about here? Well, the U.S. Census Bureau found that 31.5 million people believed they had Irish ancestry in 2021. Only Germany and England came above them in the charts.
35. Only 2 percent of people are redheads
In total, it’s suspected that a mere 2 percent of the globe’s inhabitants are redheads. And as it turns out, certain nations are more likely to harbor red-haired people than other places. For instance, Scotland’s fiery-follicled populace sits at 6 percent, and England’s is at 4 percent.
Meanwhile, Ireland’s figure reaches 10 percent: it’s the highest percentage in the world. All the same, America boasts the biggest population. Yes, the number is between 6 and 18 million citizens. So if you’re a redhead, know you aren’t alone!
36. One-fifth of all Americans live in California and Texas
There are lots of great places to live around the United States. From Hawaii to Florida, the choices are seemingly endless! Mind you, two states in particular stand out above the rest.
As per the U.S. Census Bureau, in 2020 Texas and California had the largest pull of anywhere. Statistically speaking, 20 percent of America’s entire population had a home in either the Lone Star State or the Golden State at that time.
37. Around 76 million people share the same last name
At the turn of 2020, the financial company NetCredit unveiled a fascinating map that detailed Earth’s most popular last names. Wang topped the worldwide rankings at 76 million, followed closely by Devi with 69 million.
In America, though, Smith was the last name to take the crown, with the figure coming to 2.3 million. The U.S. wasn’t alone on that front, either. Smith dominated in the United Kingdom, Australia, and Canada, too. You won’t have to look far to find one!
38. Women spend 2.6 hours on chores, compared to the 2.1 hours spent by men
If you believe that household chores should be divided evenly between men and women in America today, we’ve got some news for you. They aren’t! A report from the Bureau of Labor Statistics found that just 19 percent of guys roll their sleeves up and get stuck into housework every day.
By way of contrast, the figure for females stood at 49 percent. And it didn’t stop there. Women dedicate 2.6 hours on average to their household chores, compared to 2.1 hours spent by men.
39. 500 million requests are sent to Google every day
It’s hard to put into words just how useful of a tool Google has been over the years. Incredibly, around 100 billion questions are run through the website’s search engine each month! Having said that, though, Google hasn’t seen everything when it comes to obscure queries.
John Wiley, who helped design Google Search, claimed that some 500 million requests are sent on a daily basis that no one has entered previously. We wonder if the site welcomes those challenges...
40. Drivers in the U.S. cover a combined 2.6 trillion miles each year
How often would you say that you take to the road in your vehicle? And how far do you travel? Well, while you mull that over, here are some stats to think about. In the American Driving Survey, which is put out by the AAA Foundation for Traffic Safety, some fascinating figures were revealed.
Yep, it was found that U.S. motorists sat behind the wheel for an average of 51 minutes daily in 2016 and 2017. In that same period, they embarked on a whopping 183 billion journeys that covered 2.6 trillion miles.