I just came across this bit about asteroid Apophis and the chances of it impacting earth . "NASA scientists have recalculated the path of a large asteroid known as Apophis and now say it has only a very slim chance of banging into Earth.. The Apophis asteroid is approximately the size of two-and-a-half football fields, and updated computational techniques and newly available data indicate the probability of an Earth encounter on April 13, 2036 for Apophis has dropped from one-in-45,000 to about four-in-a million, NASA stated." So here's the bit that rubs me wrong: "four-in-a million". Why not say "one-in-250,000". If the authors are really stuck on the whole "four-in" thing then they should have said four-in-180,000 to start with. I really find inconsistencies like this baffling, I wish I knew the author and could understand what they hoped to gain by reporting the number in this way.
Comments
"What difference does it make?"
These CEO vs Plebe comparisons are merely media hype... a journalist trying to make a name for himself by pretending to raise an issue for the common man.
What difference does it make to Bob the Assembly Line Worker, if Fred the CEO makes 23089237495827 times what Bob makes? If it bothers Bob so much, what, exactly, is preventing Bob from starting down Fred's career path?
No matter what to careers you pick, one will make more than the other and you can bet that some population of the lower paid one will be pissed about that fact. They'll complain that the higher paid one really doesn't earn their money the way the lower paid one does.
The CEO vs PLEBE money thing is incarnated here in Ottawa by the Civil Servant vs Contractor money thing. Silly Servants like to bitch and moan about how much money consultants make, but you can offer a civil servant a consulting job with all the privileges and responsibilties that go with it, and most will turn it down... why? Because there's more to the money than meets the eye.